ICT news

• Orbital Datacenter Plans Need an Environmental Review, FCC Told

  11-07-2026 21:34 via science.slashdot.org
  Environmental groups want America's FCC "to slam the brakes on orbital datacenters," writes The Register.They're arguing for an environmental impact assessment for what could be 1 million satellites:Earthjustice, acting on behalf of DarkSky International, Environment America, and Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER), filed a petition this week... The filing doesn't target any single company. Instead, it asks the regulator to put the entire emerging orbital datacenter sector o
  
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• This Factory Was Severely Short On Workers. Then It Offered Flexible Work.

  11-07-2026 20:34 via it.slashdot.org
  "Flexible, app-based scheduling lets large pools of part-time workers choose four-hour shifts and even select the type of work they prefer," writes long-time Slashdot reader Tony Isaac. While the system started during the pandemic when factories faced severe labor shortages, the model is now "supplying hundreds of trained workers each week... while giving people — from retirees to sidejob hustlers to longtime employees — control over their hours."
  NPR says it's attracting "people who
  
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• China's AI Companies May Be 'Distilling' America's AI Models

  11-07-2026 19:34 via slashdot.org
  In March, Anthropic's Claude "quietly deployed software to spy on China-based customers," reports the Washington Post — apparently to unmask Chinese rivals "suspected of hijacking its technology to make their own AI tools smarter."Last week Anthropic removed the spyware "after a software developer revealed its existence and privacy advocates criticized Anthropic, saying it had surveilled its own users."Anthropic's tracking code was designed in part to catch Chinese firms "distilling" its A
  
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• EFF Celebrates 36th Anniversary, Says 'We Need You in the Fight'

  11-07-2026 18:34 via yro.slashdot.org
  "We need you in the fight," says the American legal expert in privacy, surveillance, AI, and Internet freedom of speech who became the EFF's new executive director in March.
  As EFF celebrates the anniversary of its founding 1990, "Each headline is different, but they tell one story: Many of the threats that once seemed hypothetical are now reality, and EFF's work to ensure technology supports rights, justice, freedom, and innovation for all people has never been more critical."Governments and la
  
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• Meta Says US States Seek $1.4 Trillion In Penalties In August's Youth Safety Trial

  11-07-2026 17:34 via tech.slashdot.org
  Meta "said in a court filing on Monday that four states were seeking $1.4 trillion in penalties," reports Reuters, "over accusations the company designed its Facebook and Instagram platforms to addict young users and misled the public about their safety."Meta put forward the figure in its response to the attorneys general's filings on how penalties should be calculated if the states prevailed at trial. The number, which has not previously been disclosed and is close to Meta's market capitalizati
  
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• How Flock Cameras Wrongly Tracked a Journalist for Days, Then Sent Police to Arrest Him

  11-07-2026 16:34 via yro.slashdot.org
  "Are you armed?!" the police officer screamed. "Get out of the car!"A writer for the car-news site The Drive describes how "a technological chain linking surveillance cameras, AI, and law enforcement... led to me and my wife being surrounded by police, hands on their guns, in a Kohl's parking lot in suburban Minnesota."
  After dropping off our Amazon returns, we'd just gotten back in the Range Rover and reversed maybe two feet out of the spot when four cop cars came flying out of nowhere and boxe
  
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• FCC Approves Reflect Orbital's Space Mirror Satellite That Astronomers Hate

  11-07-2026 13:00 via science.slashdot.org
  The FCC has approved (PDF) Reflect Orbital's Earendil-1 test satellite, which will use a 60-by-60-foot mirror to reflect sunlight back to Earth after dark. "The reflected light from the satellite is supposed to span an area about 3 miles wide on the ground," reports PCMag. It comes despite objections from astronomers and environmental groups who are concerned that the satellites will unleash intrusive light pollution. From the report: The approval is only for one satellite, dubbed Earendil-1, wh
  
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• China Lands Rocket During an Orbital Launch For First Time

  11-07-2026 09:00 via science.slashdot.org
  China successfully recovered an orbital rocket booster for the first time, landing the Long March 10B's first stage into a net-equipped sea platform after its maiden launch. "This mission marks my country's first successful controlled recovery of a launch vehicle and the world's first network-based recovery of a launch vehicle," the China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation (CASC) announced via social media shortly after the launch. (Translation by Google.) "It signifies a historic brea
  
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• Apple Sues OpenAI, Accusing It of Stealing Company Secrets

  11-07-2026 05:30 via yro.slashdot.org
  An anonymous reader quotes a report from The New York Times: Apple on Friday accused OpenAI of stealing secrets about products still in development, setting up a legal face-off between two of the world's biggest tech companies. In a lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, the consumer tech giant said that OpenAI, a leader in artificial intelligence that has a new hardware business, had asked job candidates from Apple to share details about secret projects an
  
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• Brown Professor Suspects Majority of His Class Used AI To Cheat

  11-07-2026 01:00 via news.slashdot.org
  Longtime Slashdot reader schwit1 shares a report from Inside Higher Ed: For the first time since he started teaching Welfare Economics and Social Choice Theory nearly two decades ago, Brown University economics professor Roberto Serrano gave his students a take-home midterm this spring. Quite a few students had expressed anxiety about being in a classroom after a gunman killed two students and injured nine in a December mass shooting at Brown, and so "it was appropriate," he said, to allow stude
  
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• Russia Hacks Doorbell Cameras To Spy On NATO Bases

  11-07-2026 00:00 via tech.slashdot.org
  Dutch intelligence agencies say Russian hackers have been hijacking unsecured internet-connected cameras, including likely doorbell and security cameras, to spy on NATO military bases and transport routes used to move weapons to Ukraine. "Organisations with IP [internet protocol] cameras on these routes have now been warned so that they could take action," said the AIVD domestic security and MIVD military intelligence agencies. Targeted NATO member states include the Netherlands and Ukraine. The
  
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