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Uproar About OS-level Age Verification LawsRich writes:Hackaday reports that unnoticed by many, several jurisdictions, including California and Brazil, have passed age verification laws that require operating system providers to keep age records of users. The uproar has now also spread among many FOSS-covering creators.The wording of the California law is vague, and the inevitable interpretation by courts might have the outcome of a mandatory cloud account connection for every computer use ("An operating system provider shall ... provide ... with respect to a particular user ... a digital signal"). It is unclear how server computing and community based distros could deal with this.It appears that the large corporate distributions are willing to cave in, but it is entirely unclear, and has not been even touched within all the uproar, how grassroots distributions like Debian will be affected with their many mirrored repositories and no central user database.System76 on Age Verification LawsAn Anonymous Coward sent in:Access is everything:

Arthur T Knackerbracket writes:https://www.siliconrepublic.com/careers/employer-education-experience-ai-expert-leadership-skills-aon

Arthur T Knackerbracket writes:https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2026/03/tech-industry-is-in-tariff-hell-even-if-refunds-are-automated/

Arthur T Knackerbracket writes:https://www.newscientist.com/article/2516990-would-aliens-do-physics-or-is-science-a-human-invention/

Freeman writes:https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2026/03/lawsuit-google-gemini-sent-man-on-violent-missions-set-suicide-countdown/

upstart writes: Clueless cops post seized crypto wallet password. $5M quickly stolen.:

Arthur T Knackerbracket writes:https://arstechnica.com/space/2026/03/congress-steps-up-pressure-on-nasa-to-support-private-space-stations/

Arthur T Knackerbracket writes:We don't have a date for the upgraded service rollout, but it isn't likely until 2027:

Arthur T Knackerbracket writes:Microscopic crystals extracted from meteorites could help settle a debate about the birth of our patch of the Milky Way:

Snotnose writes:You've heard of C++ and Windows, C and Linux. How about HolyC and TempleOS?

An Anonymous Coward writes:Jon Retting has released vscreen, a Rust service that gives AI agents a full Chromium browser with live WebRTC streaming - you see exactly what the AI sees in real-time and can take over mouse and keyboard at any point. The project provides 63 MCP (Model Context Protocol) tools for browser automation: navigation, screenshots, element discovery, cookie/CAPTCHA handling, and multi-agent coordination via lease-based locking.Built from scratch in Rust - not a Puppeteer wrapper - the codebase is ~31,000 lines across 8 crates with unsafe forbidden, 510+ tests, 3 fuzz targets, and supply chain auditing via cargo-deny. Available as pre-built Linux binaries and Docker images. Source-available, non-commercial license.https://github.com/jameswebb68/vscreen

Arthur T Knackerbracket writes:Total anonymity online is impossible, and it's dangerous to claim otherwise:

Arthur T Knackerbracket writes:By testing agent-to-agent interactions, researchers observed catastrophic system failures. Here's why that's bad news for everyone:

Arthur T Knackerbracket writes:"Ultimately, we want to build a fleet of electric harvesters"

owl writes:https://www.os2museum.com/wp/dos-memory-management/

Arthur T Knackerbracket writes:A 33% leap in capacity in six months is an impressive feat:

Arthur T Knackerbracket writes:

looorg writes:Supreme court declines to hear dispute over copyright in regards to AI generated art. So AI generated art is not copyrightable. If that is the case are other things generated by AI? Code?

Arthur T Knackerbracket writes:https://www.tomshardware.com/networking/drones-attack-several-aws-middle-east-region-data-centers-amid-iran-war-leading-to-outages-service-health-been-disrupted-after-power-cut-due-to-fire-risk

Arthur T Knackerbracket writes:

canopic jug writes:Web sites are increasingly trying to glean additional personally identifiable information from visitors in the name of authentication. Some nefarious interests actually do have a goal of tracking every minute interaction and communication tied to a real-world identity. However, if the goal is authentication and not just the collection of information, then all that is not necessary. Cryptographer and professor, Matthew Green, has a few thoughts on cryptographic engineering, specifically an illustrated primer on Anonymous credentials. He states the question as being, how do we live in a world with routine age-verification and human identification, without completely abandoning our privacy?

canopic jug writes:Retired programmer Kevin Boone has a guide to the retro-web in which he summarizes as the small web, IndieWeb, Gemini, Gopher, and so on.

upstart writes:LLMs can unmask pseudonymous users at scale with surprising accuracy:

upstart writes:Medical journal The Lancet blasts RFK Jr.'s health work as a failure:

Anonymous Coward writes:Euro News reports on a growing movement against ChatCGPT after its contract with the Pentagon:

Arthur T Knackerbracket writes:https://www.tomshardware.com/tech-industry/rising-memory-prices-pile-more-strain-on-consumer-pc-market

hubie writes:Across Cultures, People Combine Reference Frames to Orient Themselves:

canopic jug writes:The Norwegian Consumer Council has published a new report, Breaking Free: Pathways to a fair technological future, about countering big tech's growing abuse of its increasingly concentrated power. The 100-page PDF is accompanied by two cover letters, one in English to various EU/EEA/UK and US institutions, and one in Norwegian to Norwegian authorities. The report starts with the problem of platform decay now known colloquially as enshittification. One change is the demand for action to be taken proactively:

Arthur T Knackerbracket writes:https://www.slashgear.com/2112936/africa-coast-brown-ribbon-scientist-alarm/

AnonTechie writes:An interesting analysis:

hubie writes:Cleaner ship fuel is reducing lightning in key shipping lanes, KU research shows:

MotorTrend reports https://www.motortrend.com/news/kia-plant-solar-power-hail-protection that the Kia assembly plant in Georgia suffered very expensive hail damage to new cars waiting to be shipped, back in a storm in 2023. The fix is a massive raised solar array of 3.2 million square feet (300,000 meters^2) over the car park/storage area.

Arthur T Knackerbracket writes:https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2026/02/whoops-us-military-laser-strike-takes-down-cbp-drone-near-mexican-border/

Trump Bans Anthropic AI From Federal Agencies After Firm Refuses to Unlock CapabilitiesArthur T Knackerbracket writes:Anthropic cites risks of autonomous military applications, mass domestic surveillance:

Arthur T Knackerbracket writes:There's a silent vulnerability lurking underneath the architecture of Wi-Fi networks:

Arthur T Knackerbracket writes:https://www.slashgear.com/2107938/removable-battery-phones-making-comeback/

Arthur T Knackerbracket writes:https://arstechnica.com/science/2026/02/genomes-chart-the-history-of-neanderthal-modern-human-interactions/

Arthur T Knackerbracket writes:https://www.slashgear.com/2109851/states-cracking-down-drivers-move-over-laws/5def81c4f1d3d85733888dd4951cd6f1

Arthur T Knackerbracket writes:Neuron-powered computer chips can now be easily programmed to play a first-person shooter game, bringing biological computers a step closer to useful applications:

Arthur T Knackerbracket writes:https://arstechnica.com/ai/2026/02/block-lays-off-40-of-workforce-as-it-goes-all-in-on-ai-tools/c16fbef0848a80413fcac6e5598b4dc9

Arthur T Knackerbracket writes:https://www.slashgear.com/2105562/us-military-c-17-airlifts-advanced-nuclear-reactor-california-to-utah/

fliptop writes:OpenAI has closed a new funding round that could total $110 billion, valuing the ChatGPT maker at $730 billion pre-money and potentially putting it on course for an IPO in the second half of the year:

owl writes:https://osmand.net/blog/fast-routing/

fliptop writes:https://www.irregular.com/publications/vibe-password-generation

fliptop writes:A single attacker used Anthropic's Claude and OpenAI's ChatGPT to compromise nine Mexican government agencies, stealing 195 million taxpayer records and voter data:

upstart writes:Hackers Expose The Massive Surveillance Stack Hiding Inside Your Age Verification" Check:

Arthur T Knackerbracket writes:Electronic eyes are watching from above, ready to catch dumpers of smashed up couches in the act:

canopic jug writes:Blogger Ben Werdmuller has discussed an article in Nature about the political impact of the algorithm(s) used by X (formerly known as Twitter). The gist is that the use of the algorithms against X's users tends to shift about 5% of them in a specific direction. That's more than enough to tip an election one way or another especially since the damage seems persistent and lasts even after exposure ceases.

Arthur T Knackerbracket writes:12-core chiplets coming to Zen 6?

upstart writes:NASA Officially Classifies Boeing Starliner Failure As A Maximum-Level Type A Mishap - Jalopnik: