ICT news

• Protect Solar System From Mining 'Gold Rush', Say Scientists

  19-05-2019 01:34 via rss.slashdot.org
  An anonymous reader quotes the Guardian:
  Great swathes of the solar system should be preserved as official "space wilderness" to protect planets, moons and other heavenly bodies from rampant mining and other forms of industrial exploitation, scientists say. The proposal calls for more than 85% of the solar system to be placed off-limits to human development, leaving little more than an eighth for space firms to mine for precious metals, minerals and other valuable materials.
  While the limit woul
  
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• Google Urges US To Update Immigration Rules To Attract More AI Talent

  01-05-2024 20:01 via tech.slashdot.org
  
  The US could lose out on valuable AI and tech talent if some of its immigration policies are not modernized, Google says in a letter sent to the Department of Labor. From a report: Google says policies like Schedule A, a list of occupations the government "pre-certified" as not having enough American workers, have to be more flexible and move faster to meet demand in technologies like AI and cybersecurity. The company says the government must update Schedule A to include AI and cybersecurity and
  
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• Windows 10 Reaches 70% Market Share as Windows 11 Keeps Declining

  01-05-2024 19:20 via tech.slashdot.org
  
  Windows 11's market share dropped in April 2024, falling below 26% after reaching an all-time high of 28.16% in February. According to Statcounter, Windows 11 lost 0.97 points, while Windows 10 gained 0.96 points, crossing the 70% mark for the first time since September 2023. Neowin adds: Some argue that Windows 11 still offers little to no benefits for upgrading, especially in light of Microsoft killing some of the system's unique features, such as Windows Subsystem for Android. Add to that the
  
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• LastPass Separates From GoTo

  01-05-2024 18:41 via it.slashdot.org
  
  LastPass, the password manager company, has officially separated from its parent company, GoTo, following a series of high-profile hacks in recent years. The company will now operate under a shareholder holding company called LMI Parent.
  LastPass -- owned by private equity firms Francisco Partners and Elliott Management -- has faced criticism for its handling of the breaches, which resulted in the theft of customer data and encryption keys. The company has since enforced a 12-character minimum f
  
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• Microsoft Concern Over Google's Lead Drove OpenAI Investment

  01-05-2024 18:02 via tech.slashdot.org
  
  Microsoft's motivation for investing heavily and partnering with OpenAI came from a sense of falling badly behind Google, according to an internal email released Tuesday as part of the Justice Department's antitrust case against the search giant. Bloomberg: The Windows software maker's chief technology officer, Kevin Scott, was "very, very worried" when he looked at the AI model-training capability gap between Alphabet's efforts and Microsoft's, he wrote in a 2019 message to Chief Executive Offi
  
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• Global Debt Hasn't Been This Bad Since the Napoleonic Wars, Says WEF President

  01-05-2024 17:20 via news.slashdot.org
  
  The massive volumes of debt piling up around the globe forced the president of the World Economic Forum to reach back more than 200 years for a comparable period. Fortune: In an interview Sunday with CNBC at a WEF conference in Saudi Arabia, Borge Brende warned overall debt is approaching the world's total economic output. "We haven't seen this kind of debt since the Napoleonic Wars," he said. "We're getting close to 100% of global GDP in debt."
  According to the International Monetary Fund last
  
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• LinkedIn Now Has Wordle-style Games You Can Play Every Day

  01-05-2024 16:40 via games.slashdot.org
  
  LinkedIn, the professional network known for job listings and unsolicited career advice, is jumping into gaming. From a report: The platform is officially introducing a set of Wordle-style puzzle games, weeks after they were first spotted in the app. The company is starting with three games: Pinpoint, a word game where players must guess the theme that ties a series of words together; Queens, a puzzle game that's a bit like a cross between Sudoku and Minesweeper; and Crossclimb, a trivia game th
  
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• Star Scientist's Claim of 'Reverse Aging' Draws Hail of Criticism

  01-05-2024 16:00 via science.slashdot.org
  
  An anonymous reader shares a report: Harvard geneticist David Sinclair, who has said his "biological age" is roughly a decade younger than his actual one, has put forward his largely unlined face as a spokesman for the longevity movement. The 54-year-old has built his brand on the idea that aging is a treatable disease. The notion has proven so seductive that legions of acolytes follow his online postings about his research and the cocktails of supplements he consumes to stave off the inevitable
  
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• Mysterious 'gpt2-chatbot' AI Model Appears Suddenly, Confuses Experts

  01-05-2024 15:00 via slashdot.org
  
  An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: On Sunday, word began to spread on social media about a new mystery chatbot named "gpt2-chatbot" that appeared in the LMSYS Chatbot Arena. Some people speculate that it may be a secret test version of OpenAI's upcoming GPT-4.5 or GPT-5 large language model (LLM). The paid version of ChatGPT is currently powered by GPT-4 Turbo. Currently, the new model is only available for use through the Chatbot Arena website, although in a limited way. In
  
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• CISA and Partners Release Fact Sheet on Defending OT Operations Against Ongoing Pro-Russia Hacktivist Activity

  01-05-2024 14:00 via cisa.gov
  Today, CISA, in collaboration with U.S. and international partners, published a joint fact sheet, Defending OT Operations Against Ongoing Pro-Russia Hacktivist Activity. This fact sheet provides information and mitigations associated with cyber operations conducted by pro-Russia hacktivists who seek to compromise industrial control systems (ICS) and small-scale operational technology (OT) systems in North American and European critical infrastructure sectors, including Water and Wastewater Syste
  
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• CERT/CC Reports R Programming Language Vulnerability

  01-05-2024 14:00 via cisa.gov
  CERT Coordination Center (CERT/CC) has released information on a vulnerability in R programming language implementations (CVE-2024-27322). A cyber threat actor could exploit this vulnerability to take control of an affected system.
  Users and administrators are encouraged to review the following advisories and apply the necessary updates:CERT/CC VU#23819
  Hidden Layer Blog: R-Bitrary Code Execution--Vulnerability in R’s Deserialization
  Comprehensive R Archive Network
  
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• China Launches World's Largest Electric Container Ship

  01-05-2024 12:00 via hardware.slashdot.org
  
  AmiMoJo shares a report from Tech Times: China has reached a major landmark in green transportation with the launch of the world's largest fully electric container ship. Developed and manufactured by China Ocean Shipping Group (Cosco), the vessel is now operating a regular service route between Shanghai and Nanjing, aiming to reduce emissions significantly along its journey. The Greenwater 01, an all-electric container ship, is positioning itself to be a shipping industry pioneer. Equipped with
  
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• Satellite Operator SES Acquiring Intelsat In $3.1 Billion Deal

  01-05-2024 09:00 via tech.slashdot.org
  
  Satellite operator SES plans to buy fellow satellite operator Intelsat, in a $3.1 billion deal that's expected to close next year. According to Space Magazine, the combined company could help it "compete with SpaceX's huge Starlink broadband network." From the report: SES and Intelsat both operate communications satellites in geostationary orbit, which lies 22,236 miles (35,785 kilometers) above Earth. SES also runs a constellation called O3b in medium Earth orbit, at an altitude of about 5,000
  
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• America's Wind Power Production Drops For the First Time In 25 Years

  01-05-2024 05:30 via hardware.slashdot.org
  
  An anonymous reader quotes a report from Bloomberg: U.S. wind power slipped last year for the first time in a quarter-century due to weaker-than-normal Midwest breezes, underscoring the challenge of integrating volatile renewable energy sources into the grid. Power produced by turbines slipped 2% in 2023, even after developers added 6.2 gigawatts of new capacity, according to a government report Tuesday. The capacity factor for the country's wind fleet -- how much energy it's actually generating
  
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• Is Self Hosting Going Mainstream?

  01-05-2024 03:48 via tech.slashdot.org
  
  An anonymous reader shares that IPv6rs has debuted a new one-click self hosting system:Everyone seemed like they were talking about self hosting, but we didn't understand why it wasn't more prolific. Thus, we conducted a survey to hear reasons. It turned out the two most common reasons were:
  1. Lack of an external IP address
  2. Too difficult to setup and maintain
  Our service already solves the first issue. We set out with a self-hostathon to figure out what the blockers were in setting up and ru
  
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• 13.4 Million Kaiser Insurance Members Affected by Data Leak to Online Advertisers

  01-05-2024 03:00 via yro.slashdot.org
  
  Kaiser Permanente is the latest healthcare giant to report a data breach. Kaiser said 13.4 million current and former insurance members had their patient data shared with third-party advertisers, thanks to an improperly implemented tracking code the company used to see how its members navigated through its websites. Dark Reading reports: The shared data included names, IP addresses, what pages people visited, whether they were actively signed in, and even the search terms they used when visiting
  
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• Google Removes RISC-V Support From Android Common Kernel, Denies Abandoning Its Efforts

  01-05-2024 02:20 via news.slashdot.org
  
  Mishaal Rahman reports via Android Authority: Earlier today, a Senior Staff Software Engineer at Google who, according to their LinkedIn, leads the Android Systems Team and works on Android's Linux kernel fork, submitted a series of patches to AOSP that "remove ACK's support for riscv64." The description of these patches states that "support for risc64 GKI kernels is discontinued."ACK stands for Android Common Kernel and refers to the downstream branches of the official kernel.org Linux kernels
  
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• Dave & Buster's To Allow Customers To Bet On Arcade Games

  01-05-2024 01:40 via games.slashdot.org
  
  Arcade giant Dave & Buster's said it will begin allowing customers to bet on arcade games. "Customers can soon make a friendly $5 wager on a Hot Shots basketball game, a bet on a Skee-Ball competition or on another arcade game," reports CNBC. "The betting function, expected to launch in the next few months, will work through the company's app." From the report: Dave & Buster's, started in 1982, now has more than 222 venues in North America, offering everything from bowling to laser tag,
  
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• Systemd Announces 'run0' Sudo Alternative

  01-05-2024 01:00 via tech.slashdot.org
  
  An anonymous reader quotes a report from Foss Outpost: Systemd lead developer Lennart Poettering has posted on Mastodon about their upcoming v256 release of Systemd, which is expected to include a sudo replacement called "run0". The developer talks about the weaknesses of sudo, and how it has a large possible attack surface. For example, sudo supports network access, LDAP configurations, other types of plugins, and much more. But most importantly, its SUID binary provides a large attack service
  
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• Binance Founder Changpeng Zhao Sentenced To 4 Months In Prison

  01-05-2024 00:20 via slashdot.org
  
  Binance founder Changpeng Zhao has been sentenced to four months in prison after pleading guilty to charges related to enabling money laundering through his cryptocurrency exchange. CNBC reports: The sentence handed down to Zhao in Seattle federal court was significantly less than the three years that federal prosecutors had been seeking for him. The defense had asked for five months of probation. The sentencing guidelines called for a prison term of 12 to 18 months. In November, Zhao struck a d
  
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• Bruce Perens Emits Draft Post-Open Zero Cost License

  30-04-2024 23:40 via news.slashdot.org
  
  After convincing the world to buy open source and give up the Morse Code test for ham radio licenses, Bruce Perens has a new gambit: develop a license that ensures software developers receive compensation from large corporations using their work. The new Post-Open Zero Cost License seeks to address the financial disparities in open source software use and includes provisions against using content to train AI models, aligning its enforcement with non-profit performing rights organizations like AS
  
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• Change Healthcare Hackers Broke In Using Stolen Credentials, No MFA

  30-04-2024 23:00 via it.slashdot.org
  
  An anonymous reader quotes a report from TechCrunch: The ransomware gang that hacked into U.S. health tech giant Change Healthcare used a set of stolen credentials to remotely access the company's systems that weren't protected by multifactor authentication (MFA), according to the chief executive of its parent company, UnitedHealth Group (UHG). UnitedHealth CEO Andrew Witty provided the written testimony ahead of a House subcommittee hearing on Wednesday into the February ransomware attack that
  
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• Extreme Heat Continues To Scorch Large Parts of Asia

  30-04-2024 22:20 via news.slashdot.org
  
  Large swathes of Asia are sweltering through a heatwave that has topped temperature records from Myanmar to the Philippines and forced millions of children to stay home from school. From a report: In India, record temperatures have triggered a deadly heatwave and concerns about voter turnout in the nation's marathon election. Extreme heat has also forced Bangladesh to close all schools across the country. Extreme temperatures have also been recorded in Myanmar and Thailand, while huge areas of t
  
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• Supreme Court Declines To Block Texas Porn Restriction

  30-04-2024 21:40 via yro.slashdot.org
  
  The Supreme Court on Tuesday refused to block on free speech grounds a provision of Texas law aimed at preventing minors from accessing pornographic content online. From a report: The justices turned away a request made by the Free Speech Coalition, a pornography industry trade group, as well as several companies. The challengers said the 2023 law violates the Constitution's First Amendment by requiring anyone using the platforms in question, including adults, to submit personal information.
  One
  
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• How an Empty S3 Bucket Can Make Your AWS Bill Explode

  30-04-2024 21:10 via slashdot.org
  
  Maciej Pocwierz, a senior software engineer Semantive, writing on Medium: A few weeks ago, I began working on the PoC of a document indexing system for my client. I created a single S3 bucket in the eu-west-1 region and uploaded some files there for testing. Two days later, I checked my AWS billing page, primarily to make sure that what I was doing was well within the free-tier limits. Apparently, it wasn't. My bill was over $1,300, with the billing console showing nearly 100,000,000 S3 PUT requ
  
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• Biden Administration Moves To Speed Up Permits for Clean Energy

  30-04-2024 20:25 via news.slashdot.org
  
  The Biden administration on Tuesday released rules designed to speed up permits for clean energy while requiring federal agencies to more heavily weigh damaging effects on the climate and on low-income communities before approving projects like highways and oil wells. From a report: As part of a deal to raise the country's debt limit last year, Congress required changes to the National Environmental Policy Act, a 54-year-old bedrock law that requires the government to consider environmental effe
  
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• Even Walmart Thinks American Healthcare Is Too Expensive

  30-04-2024 19:20 via science.slashdot.org
  
  Walmart isn't making enough money off its new health centers, so it decided to close up shop. From a report: The retail giant announced today that it'll shutter all 51 health centers it opened up across five states since 2019. Walmart is also getting rid of its virtual care program after acquiring telehealth provider MeMD in 2021. "We determined there is not a sustainable business model for us to continue," Walmart said in an announcement today.
  "This is a difficult decision, and like others, th
  
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• Cyber Criminal Jailed For Blackmailing Therapy Patients

  30-04-2024 18:41 via yro.slashdot.org
  
  One of Europe's most wanted cyber criminals has been jailed for attempting to blackmail 33,000 people whose confidential therapy notes he stole. From a report: Julius Kivimaki obtained them after breaking into the databases of Finland's largest psychotherapy company, Vastaamo. After his attempt to extort the company failed, he emailed patients directly, threatening to reveal what they had told their therapists. At least one suicide has been linked to the case, which has shocked the country.
  Kivi
  
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• Bill Gates Is Still Pulling the Strings At Microsoft

  30-04-2024 18:00 via slashdot.org
  
  theodp writes: Reports of the death of Bill Gates' influence at Microsoft have been greatly exaggerated: "Publicly, [Bill] Gates has been almost entirely out of the picture at Microsoft since 2021, following allegations that he had behaved inappropriately toward female employees. In fact, Business Insider has learned, Gates has been quietly orchestrating much of Microsoft's AI revolution from behind the scenes. Current and former executives say Gates remains intimately involved in the company's
  
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• Major US Newspapers Sue OpenAI, Microsoft For Copyright Infringement

  30-04-2024 17:20 via yro.slashdot.org
  
  Eight prominent U.S. newspapers owned by investment giant Alden Global Capital are suing OpenAI and Microsoft for copyright infringement, in a complaint filed Tuesday in the Southern District of New York. From a report: Until now, the Times was the only major newspaper to take legal action against AI firms for copyright infringement. Many other news publishers, including the Financial Times, the Associated Press and Axel Springer, have instead opted to strike paid deals with AI companies for mil
  
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