ICT news

• Two Drone Pilots Arrested Near Boston, and Drones Cause One-Hour Runway Closure at North New York Airport

  15-12-2024 23:23 via tech.slashdot.org
  
  Saturday night two men were arrested near Boston "following a hazardous drone operation near Logan Airport's airspace," according to a police statement. They credit an officer "leveraging advanced UAS monitoring technology" who "identified the drone's location, altitude, flight history, and the operators' position."Recognizing the serious risks posed by the drone's proximity to Logan's airspace, additional resources were mobilized. The Boston Police Department coordinated with Homeland Security,
  
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• Are AI-Powered Tools - and Cheating-Detection Tools - Hurting College Students?

  15-12-2024 22:13 via news.slashdot.org
  
  A 19-year-old wrongfully accused of using AI told the Guardian's reporter that "to be accused of it because of 'signpost phrases', such as 'in addition to' and 'in contrast', felt very demeaning." And another student "told me they had been pulled into a misconduct hearing — despite having a low score on Turnitin's AI detection tool — after a tutor was convinced the student had used ChatGPT, because some of his points had been structured in a list, which the chatbot has a tendency to
  
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• Protecting 'Funko' Brand, AI-Powered 'BrandShield' Knocks Itch.io Offline After Questionable Registrar Communications

  15-12-2024 20:34 via games.slashdot.org
  
  Launched in 2013, itch.io lets users host and sell indie video games online — now offering more than 200,000 — as well as other digital content like music and comics. But then someone uploaded a page based on a major videogame title, according to Game Rant. And somehow this provoked a series of overreactions and missteps that eventually knocked all of itch.io offline for several hours...
  The page was about the first release from game developer 10:10 — their game Funko Fusion, w
  
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• Let's Encrypt Announces New-Certificate-Every-6-Days Offering

  15-12-2024 19:34 via it.slashdot.org
  
  The non-profit, free certificate authority Let's Encrypt shared some news from their executive director as they approach their 10th anniversary in 2025:Internally things have changed dramatically from what they looked like ten years ago, but outwardly our service hasn't changed much since launch. That's because the vision we had for how best to do our job remains as powerful today as it ever was: free 90-day TLS certificates via an automated API. Pretty much as many as you need. More than 500,00
  
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• Are People Starting to Love Self-Driving Robotaxis?

  15-12-2024 18:34 via tech.slashdot.org
  
  "In a tiny handful of places..." Wired wrote last month, "you can find yourself flanked by taxis with no one in the drivers' seats." But they added that "Granted, practically everyone has been numbed by the hype cycle."
  Wired's response? "[P]ile a few of us into an old-fashioned, human-piloted hired car, then follow a single Waymo robotaxi wherever it goes for a whole workday" to "study its movements, its relationship to life on the streets, its whole self-driving gestalt. We'll interview as man
  
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• Single Crystal Lithium-Ion Batteries Last 8x Longer, Researchers Show

  15-12-2024 17:34 via hardware.slashdot.org
  
  Researchers used Canada's national synchrotron light source facility "to analyze a new type of lithium-ion battery material — called a single-crystal electrode — that's been charging and discharging non-stop in a Halifax lab for more than six years," reports Tech Xplore.
  The results? The battery material "lasted more than 20,000 cycles before it hit the 80% capacity cutoff," which they say is equivalent to driving 8 million kms (nearly 5 million miles). That's more than eight times t
  
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• New 'The Witcher 4' Trailer: Pre-Rendered on an 'Unannounced' NVIDIA GeForce RTX GPU

  15-12-2024 16:34 via games.slashdot.org
  
  Witcher 4's first trailer debuted at the 2024 Game Awards — a six-minute cinema-quality thriller. It's a teaser for a game that "aims to be the most immersive and ambitious open-world Witcher game to date," according to an announcement from CD Projekt Red.The trailer is pre-rendered in a custom build of Unreal Engine 5 on an unannounced NVIDIA GeForce RTX GPU. Powered by the same tech that The Witcher IV is built on, using assets and models from the game itself, it aims to provide players
  
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• A Fake Uber Driver Borrowed Phones, Then Stole $200K in Cryptocurrency, Police Say

  15-12-2024 13:34 via mobile.slashdot.org
  
  "A man is accused of several felony charges after he allegedly posed as an Uber driver and then stole hundreds of thousands of dollars in cryptocurrency from customers in Scottsdale," reports Arizona news channel Fox 10."Prosecutors have called it an 'extremely sophisticated electronic fraud,'" reports Gizmodo, " and it's a strange approach to scamming that makes it sound unique in several ways."Nuruhussein Hussein, 40, allegedly picked up two unsuspecting people who were looking for Uber rides
  
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• Wales Police Begin Using a Facial-Recognition Phone App

  15-12-2024 09:34 via yro.slashdot.org
  
  "There are concerns human rights will be breached," reports the BBC, as Wales police forces launch a facial-recognition app that "will allow officers to use their phones to confirm someone's identity."
  The app, known as Operator Initiated Facial Recognition (OIFR), has already been tested by 70 officers across south Wales and will be used by South Wales Police and Gwent Police. Police said its use on unconscious or dead people would help officers to identify them promptly so their family can be
  
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• Why a Bacteria Can Withstand Radiation Which Would Kill a Human

  15-12-2024 05:34 via science.slashdot.org
  
  Long-time Slashdot reader smooth wombat writes: Scientist have unlocked the secret to a bacteria dubbed 'Conan the Bacterium' which is listed in the Guinness Book of World Records as the most radiant-resistant life-form. Deinococcus radiodurans can withstand radiation doses 28,000 times greater than that which would kill a human [and every other organism]. In addition, this bacteria can survive on the outside of the International Space Station for three years. It can also withstand acid, cold, a
  
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• Was the US Telecom Breach Inevitable, Proving Backdoors Can't Be Secure?

  15-12-2024 03:34 via it.slashdot.org
  
  America's 1994 "Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act" (or CALEA) created the security hole that helped enable a massive telecomm breach. But now America's FBI "is falling back on the same warmed-over, bad advice about encryption that it has trotted out for years," argues the Intercept:In response to the Salt Typhoon hack, attributed to state-backed hackers from China, the bureau is touting the long-debunked idea that federal agents could access U.S. communications without opening th
  
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• Waymo Robotaxis Pass Emergency Vehicle Review. But One Got Stuck in a Roundabout

  15-12-2024 00:34 via tech.slashdot.org
  
  An anonymous reader shared this report from The Verge:Waymo's driverless vehicles can detect emergency vehicles, know how to respond to hand signals for traffic cops, and can be disabled manually when something goes wrong, according to an independent review of the company's first responder protocols. As such, the Alphabet company's first responder protocols passed an independent review conducted by Tüv Süd, a German tech inspection company. The firm's assessment found that Waymo's Firs
  
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