ICT news

• Accidents, Not Sabotage, Likely Damaged Baltic Undersea Cables, Say US and European Intelligence Officials

  19-01-2025 23:08 via tech.slashdot.org
  
  The Washington Post reports:
  Ruptures of undersea cables that have rattled European security officials in recent months were likely the result of maritime accidents rather than Russian sabotage, according to several U.S. and European intelligence officials.
  The determination reflects an emerging consensus among U.S. and European security services, according to senior officials from three countries involved in ongoing investigations of a string of incidents in which critical seabed energy and com
  
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• Large-Scale US Solar Farms Brings 'Solar Grazing' Work for Sheep

  19-01-2025 22:06 via hardware.slashdot.org
  
  "As large-scale solar farms crop up across the U.S.," reports ABC News, "the booming solar industry has found an unlikely mascot..." Sheep.
  In Milam County, outside Austin [Texas], SB Energy operates the fifth-largest solar project in the country, capable of generating 900 megawatts of power across 4,000 acres (1,618 hectares). How do they manage all that grass? With the help of about 3,000 sheep, which are better suited than lawnmowers to fit between small crevices and chew away rain or shine.
  
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• RedNote Scrambles to Hire English-Speaking Content Moderators

  19-01-2025 20:30 via yro.slashdot.org
  
  ABC News reported that the official newspaper of China's communist party is claiming TikTok refugees on RedNote found a "new home," and "openness, communication, and mutual learning are... the heartfelt desires of people from all countries."
  But in fact, Wired reports, "China's Cyberspace Administration, the country's top internet watchdog, has reportedly already grown concerned about content being shared by foreigners on Xiaohongshu," and "warned the platform earlier this week to 'ensure China-
  
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• TikTok Goes Offline in US - Then Comes Back Online After Trump Promises 90-Day Reprieve

  19-01-2025 19:17 via tech.slashdot.org
  
  CNN reports:
  TikTok appears to be coming back online just hours after President-elect Donald Trump pledged Sunday that he would sign an executive order Monday that aims to restore the banned app. Around 12 hours after first shutting itself down, U.S. users began to have access to TikTok on a web browser and in the app, although the page still showed a warning about the shutdown.
  The brief outage was "the first time in history the U.S. government has outlawed a widely popular social media network
  
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• Node.js 'Type Stripping' for TypeScript Now Enabled by Default

  19-01-2025 17:34 via developers.slashdot.org
  
  The JavaScript runtime Node.js can execute TypeScript (Microsoft's JavaScript-derived language with static typing).But now it can do it even better, explains Marco Ippolito of the Node.js steering committee:In August 2024 Node.js introduced a new experimental feature, Type Stripping, aimed at addressing a longstanding challenge in the Node.js ecosystem: running TypeScript with no configuration. Enabled by default in Node.js v23.6.0, this feature is on its way to becoming stable.TypeScript has re
  
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• Google Upgrades Open Source Vulnerability Scanning Tool with SCA Scanning Library

  19-01-2025 16:34 via news.slashdot.org
  
  In 2022 Google released a tool to easily scan for vulnerabilities in dependencies named OSV-Scanner. "Together with the open source community, we've continued to build this tool, adding remediation features," according to Google's security blog, "as well as expanding ecosystem support to 11 programming languages and 20 package manager formats... Users looking for an out-of-the-box vulnerability scanning CLI tool should check out OSV-Scanner, which already provides comprehensive language package
  
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• Are 'Career Catfishers' Justified In Not Showing Up for Work?

  19-01-2025 13:34 via it.slashdot.org
  
  Fortune reports 18% of workers have engaged in "career catfishing" — getting a job offer, but then refusing to show up on the first day of work.
  And when someone posted Fortune's article to Reddit's antiwork subreddit, it drew 2,100 upvotes -- and another 84 comments. ("I love doing this...! This feels really great to do after a company has jerked you around, and basically said that several other people were in line ahead of you... after five interviews.")
  But Fortune reports there's other
  
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• Scientists Probe Mysterious Oxygen Source Possibly Discovered on the Sea Floor

  19-01-2025 09:34 via news.slashdot.org
  
  CNN has the latest on "a startling discovery made public in July that metallic rocks were apparently producing oxygen on the Pacific Ocean's seabed, where no light can penetrate.
  "Initial research suggested potato-size nodules rich in metals, predominantly found 4,000 meters (13,100 feet) below the surface in the Clarion-Clipperton Zone, released an electrical charge, splitting seawater into oxygen and hydrogen through electrolysis."The unprecedented natural phenomenon challenges the idea that o
  
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• A 'Hubble Crisis'? New Measurement Confirms Universe is Expanding Too Fast for Current Models

  19-01-2025 06:34 via science.slashdot.org
  
  "The universe is expanding faster than predicted by theoretical models," writes Phys.org, "and faster than can be explained by our current understanding of physics." There's now been new confirmation of this (published in The Astrophysical Journal Letters) by a team led by Dan Scolnic, an associate professor of physics at Duke University.
  And this means the so-called Hubble tension "now turns into a crisis," said Dan Scolnic, who led the research team... This is saying, to some respect, that our
  
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• After PFAS Contamination on English Channel Island, Government Panel Recommends Bloodletting for Those Affected

  19-01-2025 04:34 via science.slashdot.org
  
  Jersey is an island in the English channel, "a self-governing British Crown Dependency near the coast of northwest France," according to Wikipedia — population: 103,267.
  But now some residents of Jersey "have been recommended bloodletting to reduce high concentrations of 'forever chemicals' in their blood," reports the Guardian, "after tests showed some islanders have levels that can lead to health problems."
  Private drinking water supplies in Jersey were polluted by the use of firefightin
  
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• On Eve of TikTok Ban, Chinese App RedNote Surges in Popularity, Delighting Chinese State Media

  19-01-2025 02:34 via yro.slashdot.org
  
  Chinese social-networking site RedNote became the #1 most-downloaded app in America, reports the Associated Press, with some new users considering it a way to protest America's possible TikTok ban.
  So what happened next?
  They were met with surprise, curiosity and in-jokes on Xiaohongshu — literally, "Little Red Book" — whose users saw English-language posts take over feeds almost overnight. Americans introduced themselves with hashtag TikTok refugees, ask me anything attitude and pos
  
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• WSJ Reports 'The Balance of Power is Shifting Back to Bosses'

  19-01-2025 00:18 via it.slashdot.org
  
  The ratio of vacant U.S. jobs to jobless workers "has fallen from a record of 2 in 2022 to 1.1 in November," reports the Wall Street Journal — which adds that "the balance of power between employers and employees has shifted as the labor market has gone from white-hot to merely solid."
  JP Morgan's five-days-a-week return-to-office mandate was only the beginning, with big companies like Amazon and Dell "tightening remote-work policies, shrinking travel budgets and cutting back on benefits..
  
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