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Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers has used his partial veto power to make a creative line-item change to the state budget, securing increased funding for public schools until 2425 instead of 2025. The BBC reports: Republicans have reacted with fury to what they call "an unprecedented brand-new way to screw the taxpayer." The move could however be undone by a legal challenge or future governor. It is the latest tussle between Mr Evers, a former public school teacher who narrowly won re-election last year, and a Republican-controlled state legislature that has often blocked his agenda. Their original budget proposal had raised the amount local school districts could generate via property taxes, by $325 per student, for the next two school years. But Wisconsin allows its governors to alter certain pieces of legislation by striking words and numbers as they see fit before signing them into law - what is known as partial veto power. Both Democrats and Republicans have flexed their partial veto authority for years, with Mr Evers' Republican predecessor once deploying it to extend a state program's deadline by one thousand years. This week, before he signed the biennial state budget into law, the governor altered language that applied the $325 increase to the 2023-24 and 2024-25 school years, vetoing a hyphen and a "20" to instead make the end date 2425. He also used his power to remove proposed tax cuts for the state's wealthiest taxpayers and protect some 180 diversity, equity and inclusion jobs Republicans wanted to cut at the public University of Wisconsin.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from TechCrunch: A decentralized group of safe streets activists in San Francisco realized they can disable Cruise and Waymo robotaxis by placing a traffic cone on a vehicle's hood, and they're encouraging others to do it, too. The "Week of Cone," as the group is calling the now-viral prank on Twitter and TikTok, is a form of protest against the spread of robotaxi services in the city, and it appears to be gaining traction with residents who are sick of the vehicles malfunctioning and blocking traffic. The protest comes in the lead-up to a hearing that will likely see Waymo and Cruise expand their robotaxi services in San Francisco. The California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) is set to approve the expansion of both Cruise's and Waymo's autonomous vehicle passenger service deployments in San Francisco on July 13. The agency doesn't give companies permission to operate their AVs on public roads -- that's the Department of Motor Vehicles' domain. But it does grant companies the authority to charge passengers a fare for that service, which is an essential ingredient to scaling robotaxi and autonomous delivery operations sustainably. In May, the CPUC posted draft resolutions approving the expansion, despite mounting opposition from city agencies and residents. Opponents called out the string of AVs that have impeded traffic, public transit and emergency responders, and asked that the CPUC move cautiously, set up workshops, collect more data, prohibit robotaxi deployment downtown and during peak hours, and limit the expansion of fleet sizes. Other opponents like the San Francisco Taxi Workers Alliance and the Alliance for Independent Workers have protested the spread of robotaxis, which they say will eliminate the need for taxi and ride-hail drivers. Safe Street Rebel's cone campaign is a bid to raise awareness and invite more pissed-off San Franciscans to submit public comments to the CPUC before next week's hearing. "These companies promise their cars will reduce traffic and collisions, but instead they block buses, emergency vehicles and everyday traffic," reads one video posted on social media. "They even un-alived a person and a dog. And they're partnering with the police to record everyone all the time without anyone's consent. And most importantly they require streets that are designed for cars, not people or transit. They exist only for profit-driven car companies to stay dominant and make it harder for transit to stay afloat." While the above statement is a bit hyperbolic, there are nuggets of truth. [...] Nonetheless, the group brings up a common concern about unleashing autonomous vehicles onto public roads -- the lack of input from everyday people who have to deal with the vehicles on the ground. Congressional efforts to regulate self-driving cars have lagged for several years, so most regulation comes from state departments of transportation and departments of motor vehicles. The group is inviting others to follow its lead and disable the vehicles by "gently placing" cones on a driverless -- meaning, empty -- car's hood. Some people are apparently sending in submissions, but it's unclear how many people have sent images to Safe Street Rebel. "Not only is this understanding of how AVs operate incorrect, but this is vandalism and encourages unsafe and disrespectful behavior on our roadways," Waymo said in a statement. "We will notify law enforcement of any unwanted or unsafe interference of our vehicles on public roadways." "Cruise's fleet provides free rides to late-night service workers without more reliable transportation options, has delivered over 2 million meals to food insecure San Franciscans, and recovers food waste from local businesses," said Cruise in a statement. "Intentionally obstructing vehicles gets in the way of those efforts and risks creating traffic congestion for local residents."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Reddit is fighting another attempt by film companies to unmask anonymous Reddit users who discussed piracy. From a report: The same companies lost a previous, similar motion to identify Reddit users who wrote comments in piracy-related threads. Reddit avoided revealing the identities of eight users by arguing that the First Amendment protected their right to anonymous speech. Reddit is seeking a similar outcome in the new case, in which the film companies' subpoena to Reddit sought "Basic account information including IP address registration and logs from 1/1/2016 to present, name, email address and other account registration information" for six users who wrote comments on Reddit threads in 2011 and 2018.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

An artificial-intelligence tool has shown promise at helping doctors fight aggressive brain tumors by identifying characteristics that help guide surgery. From a report: The tool -- called the Cryosection Histopathology Assessment and Review Machine, or CHARM -- studies images to quickly pick out the genetic profile of a kind of tumor called glioma, a process that currently takes days or weeks, said Kun-Hsing Yu, senior author of a report released Friday in the journal Med. Surgeons use detailed diagnoses to guide them while they operate, Yu said, and the ability to get them rapidly could improve patients' outcomes and spare them from multiple surgeries. While glioma varies in severity, an aggressive form called glioblastoma can lead to death in less than six months if untreated. Only 17% of people with glioblastoma survive their second year after being diagnosed, according to the American Association of Neurological Surgeons. Surgeons use information about the genetic profile of a glioma tumor when deciding how much tissue to remove from a patient's brain, as well as whether to implant wafers coated in a cancer-fighting drug. Getting that information, however, currently requires time-consuming testing. Yu and his team of researchers trained a machine-learning algorithm to do the work by showing it pictures of samples gathered during brain surgery, and then checking its work against those patients' diagnoses. CHARM learned to match or outperform other AI systems at identifying the genetic profile of a tumor.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Jony Ive has been busy since leaving Apple, with his design agency working on things like a typeface, a charity clown nose and "the future of Airbnb." LoveFrom's latest project takes Ive back to his hardware days -- it's a new model of a modular turntable that's been around for half a century. From a report: LoveFrom helped refine Linn's Sondek LP12 for a 50th anniversary edition. Ive told Fast Company it was a "very gentle and modest project" for LoveFrom that stems from his team's admiration for Linn. Perhaps as a result of that, LoveFrom carried out the work pro bono. "There are many things that I've always wanted to be able to do purely for the love of doing them," Ive noted. The design firm approached Linn about working together, in part because Ive is a long-time fan of the brand. The two teams examined every aspect of the LP12 but couldn't change the turntable very much owing to concerns over impact to the sound quality. Still, LoveFrom "saw a number of areas where there could be small improvements and gentle evolutions of the current design," Ive said. [...] If you're interested in owning the first post-Apple hardware that Ive worked on, you'll have to dig deep into your pockets. The Sondek LP12-50 costs $60,000 and Linn is only making 250 of them.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

The public cloud services market jumped in value by nearly 23pc last year, reaching $545.8bn in global revenue. SiliconRepublic: A new report by the International Data Corporation (IDC) claims that all sections in this market saw growth last year, with Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) applications retaining the top spot and representing more than 45pc of total revenue last year. The report found that revenue for foundational cloud services "that support digital-first strategies" grew by nearly of 29pc. The IDC said this increased growth highlights an increasing reliance of enterprises on cloud platforms built around "widely deployed compute services, data/AI services and app framework services." Dave McCarthy, vice president in IDC's worldwide infrastructure practice, said cloud providers are making "significant investments" in high-performance infrastructure, which can help create the "foundation for new AI software that can be quickly deployed at scale." This verdict was shared by Rick Villars, group VP of ICD worldwide research, who said the use of AI is starting to "dominate the long-term investment agendas of businesses and cloud providers."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Open-world sci-fi RPG Cyberpunk 2077's biggest subreddit recently switched to NSFW (not safe for work,) with the explanation that the game it is focused on is a mature game filled with nudity and gore. However, Reddit allegedly demanded that mods of the subreddit quickly revert the change. From a report: The mods aren't complying and users are now posting nude images of in-game characters as part of a protest to show why the subreddit deserves to be NSFW. Since May, Reddit has been at war with its users and subreddits as the company clamps down on third-party apps and their ability to access the site's backend or API. It's not gone well for Reddit, leading to popular subreddits like r/bestof, r/sports, and r/music going dark. And as part of this ongoing backlash, some subreddits switched to NSFW. This designation is reserved mainly for porn-y subreddits and blocks ads from appearing, but also lets users freely post nudity and more adult content. Some mods and subreddits have used this designation to punch back at Reddit and its despised CEO. Now the Cyberpunk 2077 subreddit has seemingly wandered into this mess. According to a post from July 5 by moderator Tabnam, the decision to make the Cyberpunk 2077 subreddit NSFW was made because the game is "an 18+ game" and happened now because the mods had "never thought to change it until recently." Tabnam added that this subreddit should have already been NSFW. This decision apparently didn't go over well with Reddit.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

The UN secretary general has said that "climate change is out of control," as an unofficial analysis of data showed that average world temperatures in the seven days to Wednesday were the hottest week on record. From a report: "If we persist in delaying key measures that are needed, I think we are moving into a catastrophic situation, as the last two records in temperature demonstrates," Antonio Guterres said, referring to the world temperature records broken on Monday and Tuesday. The average global air temperature was 17.18C (62.9F) on Tuesday, according to data collated by the US National Centers for Environmental Prediction (NCEP), surpassing the record 17.01C reached on Monday. For the seven-day period ending Wednesday, the daily average temperature was .04C (.08F) higher than any week in 44 years of record-keeping, according to the University of Maine's Climate Reanalyzer data. That metric showed that Earth's average temperature on Wednesday remained at the record high of 17.18C. Climate Reanalyzer uses data from the NCEP climate forecast system to provide a time series of daily mean two-metre air temperature, based on readings from surface, air balloon and satellite observations. The US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), whose figures are considered the gold standard in climate data, said on Thursday it could not validate the unofficial numbers. It noted that the reanalyzer uses model output data, which it called "not suitable" as substitutes for actual temperatures and climate records. The NOAA monitors global temperatures and records on a monthly and an annual basis, not daily.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Chinese regulators imposed more than $1 billion in fines on tech giants Ant Group and Tencent Holdings, signalling an end to a crackdown on the sector that had wiped out billions in market value and derailed the world's biggest initial public offering. From a report: The People's Bank of China fined Ant 7.12 billion yuan ($984 million), wrapping more than two years of probes into the finance technology giant founded by billionaire Jack Ma. Tencent was levied a 2.99 billion yuan fine, according to statements from the central bank Friday. Shares in Ant affiliate Alibaba Group Holding soared more than 6% in New York trading. Investors are betting the fines draw a line under the multi-year crackdown that torpedoed Ant's planned IPO in 2020 and ensnared some of the nation's most powerful private firms in sectors from online education to gaming. It paves the way for Ant to revive growth and eventually resurrect plans for an IPO.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

The F.B.I. searched the home of the cryptocurrency executive Jesse Powell in March as part of a criminal investigation into claims that he hacked and cyber-stalked a nonprofit that he founded, The New York Times reported this week, citing people with knowledge of the matter. From the report: The investigation focused on an allegation by the nonprofit that Mr. Powell, who also founded the cryptocurrency exchange Kraken, had interfered with its computer accounts, blocking access to emails and other messages, the people said. Agents with the F.B.I. and the U.S. attorney's office for the Northern District of California have been looking into Mr. Powell since at least last fall, three people with knowledge of the case said. Agents searched Mr. Powell's home in the Brentwood neighborhood of Los Angeles and seized electronic devices, according to a person familiar with the search and documents reviewed by The New York Times. Prosecutors have not accused Mr. Powell of any crimes. Brandon Fox, a lawyer for Mr. Powell, confirmed that he was under investigation by federal prosecutors in Northern California. Mr. Fox said the investigation was focused on the allegations by the arts group, Verge Center for the Arts, and "in no way related to Mr. Powell's employment or his conduct in the cryptocurrency arena." He also said Mr. Powell "did nothing wrong."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Politico: The FDA on Thursday granted traditional approval to an Alzheimer's drug for the first time in more than two decades. Now, the question becomes how many people will be able to access the drug, which is targeted at patients in the early stages of the debilitating disease. Medicare has said that it will reimburse the drug's costs -- more than $26,000 annually -- only for beneficiaries enrolled in a nationwide registry that tracks patient side effects and outcomes over time. Patient advocacy groups and some clinicians fear this means that few of the hundreds of thousands of Alzheimer's patients eligible for the treatment will be able to access it. The agency previously granted Leqembi, developed and manufactured by Eisai and Biogen, accelerated approval before evaluating late-stage clinical trial data earlier this year. The drug moderately slowed trial participants' cognitive decline compared to a placebo, according to the data, but had potentially serious side effects, including brain swelling and bleeding. Under accelerated approval, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services said it would cover Leqembi only for those participating in a randomized clinical trial, of which none were enrolling. Medicare's coverage determination was contrary to the Veterans Health Administration, which said it would cover the drug for its beneficiaries without restriction. Roughly 6.7 million people in the U.S. have Alzheimer's, and there are few treatments for the disease. Aduhelm, a drug from Biogen that received accelerated approval in 2021, works similarly to Leqembi by targeting proteins thought to be one of the causes of the disease. But both drugs have received little uptake due to Medicare coverage restrictions, and patient and caregiver concerns over the evidence of its modest benefits. There are five existing treatments for Alzheimer's that treat some of the disease's symptoms, but do not slow progression of the disease.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Inflection AI, an AI startup company, has built a cutting-edge supercomputer equipped with 22,000 NVIDIA H100 GPUs. Wccftech reports: For those unfamiliar with Inflection AI, it is a business that aims at creating "personal AI for everyone." The company is widely known for its recently introduced Inflection-1 AI model, which powers the Pi chatbot. Although the AI model hasn't yet reached the level of ChatGPT or Google's LaMDA models, reports suggest that Inflection-1 performs well on "common sense" tasks, making it much more suitable for applications such as personal assistance.> Coming back, Inflection announced that it is building one of the world's largest AI-based supercomputers, and it looks like we finally have a glimpse of what it would be. It is reported that the Inflection supercomputer is equipped with 22,000 H100 GPUs, and based on analysis, it would contain almost 700 four-node racks of Intel Xeon CPUs. The supercomputer will utilize an astounding 31 Mega-Watts of power. The surprising fact about the supercomputer is the acquisition of 22,000 NVIDIA H100 GPUs. We all are well aware that, in recent times, it has been challenging to acquire even a single unit of the H100s since they are in immense demand, and NVIDIA cannot cope with the influx of orders. In the case of Inflection AI, NVIDIA is considering being an investor in the company, which is why in their case, it is easier to get their hands on such a massive number of GPUs.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Stephen Clark writes via Ars Technica: When India's ambassador to the US signed up his country to the Artemis Accords last month, it signaled the world's most populous nation -- with a growing prowess in spaceflight -- could be turning toward the United States as a partner in space exploration. India became the 27th country to sign the Artemis Accords, a non-binding set of principles among like-minded nations guiding a vision for peaceful and transparent exploration of space. The accords cover the international registration of human-made space objects, the open release of scientific data, and an agreement for nations not to claim territory on the Moon or other planetary bodies, among other tenets. Details about future cooperation between the US and India remain scarce. Nelson plans to travel to India later this year for meetings and discussions with Indian space officials. One objective of Nelson's trip will be to hammer out broad objectives for a "strategic framework" for human spaceflight cooperation. Despite the name of the Artemis Accords, there's no guarantee that India will play a significant role in NASA's Artemis program to return astronauts to the Moon and eventually send humans to Mars. "There's no implication of a signatory to the Artemis accords also being part of the Artemis program," Nelson told Ars. But none of the other 26 signatories to the Artemis Accords -- a list that includes European space powers and Japan -- has their own human spaceflight program. India is developing a human-rated spacecraft called Gaganyaan that could be ready to fly people into low-Earth orbit in 2025, several years later than originally planned. "The fact that they are a nation that intends in the future to fly own their own astronauts, is that significant? The answer is yes," Nelson said. "I think it's of significance that a major country that's not considered aligned with the US (is) a signatory." "I've described India as a sleeping giant and one that is quickly awakening," Gold told Ars. "India is absolutely vital to global space development, and Artemis in particular, since the country is active with lunar programs, Martian programs, and now even human spaceflight." "Where India might fit into the Artemis program is still to be determined," writes Clark. "The partnership between the US and India in space could take a step forward next year with the flight of an Indian astronaut to the International Space Station. NASA has agreed to provide advanced training to Indian astronauts at the Johnson Space Center in Houston before a flight opportunity to the space station in low-Earth orbit." India's space program has "held closer ties with Russia in the past," notes Clark. "Russia provided upper-stage engines for India's GSLV Mk.II rocket until India developed its own engine for the job. And four Indian astronauts slated for the Gaganyaan program completed more than a year of training at Russia's Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center near Moscow in 2021, according to Indian media." "Despite India's overture toward a closer relationship with NASA, the Asian power remains linked with Russia," adds Clark. "India still imports significant amounts of Russian oil and has not officially condemned Russia's invasion of Ukraine."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from the Associated Press: The planet's temperature spiked on Tuesday to its hottest day in decades and likely centuries, and Wednesday could become the third straight day Earth unofficially marks a record-breaking high. It's the latest in a series of climate-change extremes that alarm but don't surprise scientists. The globe's average temperature reached 62.9 degrees Fahrenheit (17.18 degrees Celsius) on Tuesday, according to the University of Maine's Climate Reanalyzer, a common tool based on satellite data, observations, and computer simulations and used by climate scientists for a glimpse of the world's condition. On Monday, the average temperature was 62.6 degrees Fahrenheit (17.01 degrees Celsius), setting a record that lasted only 24 hours. University of Maine climate scientist Sean Birkle, creator of the Climate Reanalyzer, said the daily figures are unofficial but a useful snapshot of what's happening in a warming world. Think of it as the temperature of someone who's ill, he said: It tells you something might be wrong, but you need longer-term records to work like a doctor's exam for a complete picture. While the figures are not an official government record, "this is showing us an indication of where we are right now," said National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration chief scientist Sarah Kapnick. And NOAA indicated it will take the figures into consideration for its official record calculations. Even though the dataset used for the unofficial record goes back only to 1979, Kapnick said that given other data, the world is likely seeing the hottest day in "several hundred years that we've experienced." Scientists generally use much longer measurements -- months, years, decades -- to track the Earth's warming. But the daily highs are an indication that climate change is reaching uncharted territory.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Yolanda Diaz, Spain's Labor Minister and candidate for Prime Minister with the progressive platform Sumar, has proposed a scheme to tackle social inequality by giving every young person in the country 20,000 euros (roughly $21,776) to spend on school, training or starting a business once they reach the age of 18. The Guardian reports: According to Diaz's Sumar platform, which announced the policy before Spain's snap general election on 23 July, the initiative would cost 10 billion euros, which would be raised by taxing the rich. Sumar said the aim was to guarantee "equality of opportunity" regardless of people's family backgrounds or earnings. The payments, which would begin at the age of 18 and continue until the age of 23, would be accompanied by administrative support to help people study, train or establish their own business. DAaz confirmed that the policy -- called the "universal inheritance" -- would be available to all young Spaniards regardless of their economic circumstances and would be funded by taxing people earning more than 3 million euros a year. Sumar estimates it would cost 0.8% of Spain's GDP. The minister, who was raised in a staunchly communist household, said she had been unable to follow her own dreams of becoming an employment inspector because there was not enough money for her to spend years studying. "Becoming an employment inspector in Spain would have taken about five years," she said. "I'm not an employment inspector because I'm the daughter of working-class parents and I could never have allowed myself to do that. This is a redistributive measure that will allow the young people of our country to have a future regardless of their surname."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

The new Nubia RedMagic 8S Pro+ features support for up to 24GB of RAM -- the same amount of RAM found in a 13-inch top-spec M2 MacBook Pro. Ars Technica reports: The base model of the RedMagic 8S Pro+ starts with 16GB of RAM, but GSMArena has pictures and details of the upgraded 24GB SKU, which is the most amount of memory ever in an Android phone. Because we're all about big numbers, it also comes with 1TB of storage. This suped-up 24GB version of the phone appears to be a China-exclusive, with the price at CNY 7,499 (about $1,034), which is a lot for a phone in China. Other specs include a new "Snapdragon 8+ Gen 2" variant, which appears to be the same higher-clocked version that Samsung gets for the S23. This runs at 3.36 GHz as opposed to the normal 3.2 GHz. There's a 6.8-inch, 120 Hz 2480x1116 OLED display and a 5000 mAh battery with a blazing-fast 165 W charging that can fully charge in 14 minutes. The display has an under-screen front camera, because selfies would just get in the way of gaming. The design is interesting -- it's just all right angles without a single smoothed-over edge on the entire phone. The sides are flat, the back is flat, and the corners are super tall, with almost no corner radius at all. In landscape mode, there are touch-sensitive shoulder buttons along the top edge for additional gaming controls, but it does not look comfortable to have to wrap your fingers around those hard corners. Just picture the smooth curves of an SNES controller compared to this thing -- even the example image does not look very comfortable. For color options, it comes in black, silver, or a clear back panel with a faux-mechanical design under it, just like a Nothing Phone. That little rainbow circle on the back is a spinning, 20,000 RPM blower fan that pushes heat out the side, so you'll presumably be gaming with cool temps for a long time. The phone is up for pre-order today in China and ships on July 11.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

European Union regulators have opened an official investigation into Amazon's proposed $1.7 billion acquisition of iRobot, the company behind the popular Roomba lineup of robot vacuum cleaners. The Verge reports: In a press release, the European Commission said it's concerned that "the transaction would allow Amazon to restrict competition in the market for robot vacuum cleaners ('RVCs') and to strengthen its position as online marketplace provider." The European Commission is also looking at how getting access to iRobot users' data may give Amazon an advantage "in the market for online marketplace services to third-party sellers (and related advertising services) and / or other data-related markets." The European Commission will make a decision about if it will block the deal by November 15th. Amazon announced plans to acquire iRobot for $1.7 billion in August last year. Amazon spokesperson Alexandra Miller said in a statement: "We continue to work through the process with the European Commission and are focused on addressing its questions and any identified concerns at this stage. iRobot, which faces intense competition from other vacuum cleaner suppliers, offers practical and inventive products. We believe Amazon can offer a company like iRobot the resources to accelerate innovation and invest in critical features while lowering prices for consumers."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Gizmodo: Amidst ongoing protests in France, the country has just passed a new bill that will allow police to remotely access suspects' cameras, microphones, and GPS on cell phones and other devices. As reported by Le Monde, the bill has been criticized by the French people as a "snoopers" charter that allows police unfettered access to the location of its citizens. Moreover, police can activate cameras and microphones to take video and audio recordings of suspects. The bill will reportedly only apply to suspects in crimes that are punishable by a minimum of five years in jail and Justice Minister Eric Dupond-Moretti claimed that the new provision would only affect a few dozen cases per year. During a debate over the bill yesterday, French politicians added an amendment that orders judge approval for any surveillance conducted under the scope of the bill and limits the duration of surveillance to six months, according to Le Monde. "For organized crime, the police can have access to the sound and image of a device. This concerns any connected device: telephone, speaker microphone, computer camera, computer system of a car... all without the knowledge of the persons concerned," French advocacy group La Quadrature du Net said in a statement on Twitter last month, machine translated by Gizmodo. "In view of the growing place of digital tools in our lives, accepting the very principle that they are transformed into police auxiliaries without our being aware of it poses a serious problem in our societies." In 2021, France passed a bill that would expand the French police force's ability to monitor civilians using drones -- all in an effort to protect officers from increasingly violent protestors, according to French President Emmanuel Macron.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

The July 1 deadline for the US airline industry came and went, and not much happened. "We're not aware of any disruptions specifically related to 5G over the weekend," wrote Ian Petchenik, director of communications for Flightradar24, on Monday. Mike Dano writes via Light Reading: Petchenik noted the flight-tracking company does not specifically collect data on the types of issues that delay flights. Regardless, the situation is remarkable considering warnings of "major disruptions," "chaos" and the possibility that "the nation's commerce will grind to a halt" if 5G gets too close to airplanes in the US. Broadly, the high-stakes standoff between the US wireless industry and the airline industry -- which kicked into high gear just over a year ago -- appears to be something that both sides now mostly want to forget.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Uber Eats, DoorDash, and GrubHub filed lawsuits on Thursday seeking to strike down New York City's minimum wage law for delivery workers. The New York Times reports: Uber, DoorDash and Grubhub on Thursday each filed a request for a temporary restraining order in State Supreme Court in Manhattan to stop the wage changes from going into effect on July 12. Relay, a smaller, New York-based food delivery platform, did the same. The new pay standard, which was announced last month, would require gig platforms to pay food delivery workers about $18 per hour and to increase that amount to $20 per hour by 2025. Delivery workers currently make around $11 an hour, according the city's estimate. But Uber and the other gig companies say they will be forced to pass on the cost of the higher wages to consumers by raising prices. They argue that the city's modeling does not correctly calculate the degree to which these higher prices will harm local restaurants. And they say that the new system will work to deliverers' disadvantage because the company, to control costs, will have to strictly monitor how much time they spend online on the apps but not actually doing deliveries. "The rule must be paused before damaging the restaurants, consumers and couriers it claims to protect," Josh Gold, an Uber spokesman, said in a statement. In a prepared statement, Vilda Vera Mayuga, the commissioner of New York City's Department of Consumer and Worker Protection, defended the new wage standard. "Delivery workers, like all workers, deserve fair pay for their labor, and we are disappointed that Uber, DoorDash, Grubhub and Relay disagree," she said. "These workers brave thunderstorms, extreme heat events and risk their lives to deliver for New Yorkers -- and we remain committed to delivering for them."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Globe and Mail: A Saskatchewan judge says an emoji can amount to a contractual agreement and ordered a farmer to pay more than $82,000 for not delivering product to a grain buyer after responding to a text message with a thumbs-up image. The Court of King's Bench decision said a grain buyer with South West Terminal sent a text to farmers in March 2021 saying that the company was looking to buy 86 tons of flax for $17 per bushel to be delivered in the fall. The buyer, Kent Mickleborough, later spoke with Swift Current farmer Chris Achter on the phone and texted a picture of a contract to deliver the flax in November, adding "please confirm flax contract." Achter texted back a thumbs-up emoji. But when November came around, the flax was not delivered and prices for the crop had increased. Mickleborough said the emoji amounted to an agreement because he had texted numerous contracts to Achter, who previously confirmed through text message and always fulfilled the order. But the farmer argued that the emoji indicated only that he'd received the contract in the text message. "I deny that he accepted the thumbs-up emoji as a digital signature of the incomplete contract," Achter said in an affidavit to court. "I did not have time to review the Flax Contract and merely wanted to indicate that I did receive his text message." Justice Timothy Keene said in his June decision that the thumbs-up emoji did meet signature requirements and therefore the farmer breached his contract. The judge pointed to a Dictionary.com definition of the thumbs-up emoji, which said it is used to express assent, approval or encouragement in digital communications. "This court readily acknowledges that a (thumbs-up) emoji is a non-traditional means to `sign' a document but nevertheless under these circumstances this was a valid way to convey the two purposes of a `signature,"' Keene wrote in his decision. Keene's decision noted the case is novel, but the judge said emojis are now commonly used.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

A monthslong test with some of the world's largest banks found that digital dollars could be an effective way to improve domestic and cross-border payments, according to a unit of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. A report adds: The Fed's New York Innovation Center spent 12 weeks testing a technology known as a regulated liability network, which allows banks to simulate issuing digital money representing their customers' own funds before settling through central bank reserves on a distributed ledger. The test proved to the Fed that these so-called digital dollars have the ability to improve wholesale payments, and that the use of the ledger didn't alter the legal treatment of the deposits. "From a central banking perspective, the proof of concept was conducive to exploring tokenized regulated deposits and understanding the potential functional benefits of central bank and commercial bank digital money operating together on a shared ledger," Per von Zelowitz, director of the New York Innovation Center, said in a statement.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

The FBI's primary tool for monitoring social media threats is the same contractor that labeled peaceful Black Lives Matter protest leaders DeRay McKesson and Johnetta Elzie as "threat actors" requiring "continuous monitoring" in 2015. From a report: The contractor, ZeroFox, identified McKesson and Elzie as posing a "high severity" physical threat, despite including no evidence that McKesson or Elzie were suspected of criminal activity. "It's been almost a decade since the referenced 2015 incident and in that time we have invested heavily in fine-tuning our collections, analysis and labeling of alerts," Lexie Gunther, a spokesperson for ZeroFox, told The Intercept, "including the addition of a fully managed service that ensures human analysis of every alert that comes through the ZeroFox Platform to ensure we are only alerting customers to legitimate threats and are labeling those threats appropriately." The FBI, which declined to comment, hired ZeroFox in 2021, a fact referenced in the new 106-page Senate report about the intelligence community's failure to anticipate the January 6, 2021, uprising at the U.S. Capitol. The June 27 report, produced by Democrats on the Senate Homeland Security Committee, shows the bureau's broad authorities to surveil social media content -- authorities the FBI previously denied it had, including before Congress. It also reveals the FBI's reliance on outside companies to do much of the filtering for them. The FBI's $14 million contract to ZeroFox for "FBI social media alerting" replaced a similar contract with Dataminr, another firm with a history of scrutinizing racial justice movements. Dataminr, like ZeroFox, subjected the Black Lives Matter movement to web surveillance on behalf of the Minneapolis Police Department, previous reporting by The Intercept has shown.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

After surpassing 10 million sign-ups in the first seven hours, Meta's new Twitter rival, Threads, has reached a new milestone: 30 million sign-ups in less than 24 hours. TechCrunch reports: Threads passed 2 million signups in its first two hours live in the App Store and shows no signs of slowing down. Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg noted the milestone on his Threads account. Threads was available for "preorder" through iOS, notifying users who were alerted of its existence through a flashy Instagram cross-promotion. Threads is deeply tied into Instagram and Instagram accounts now display a Threads user number so the counting is both transparent and happening in real time. Users who opted into the Threads pre-launch received a push notification when Threads went live on Wednesday afternoon and could immediately hop into Meta's latest app. Threads is also now the fastest app to cross the 1 million users mark, beating ChatGPT's record. Further reading: Twitter Threatens To Sue Meta Over ThreadsRead more of this story at Slashdot.

OpenAI today announced the general availability of GPT-4, its latest text-generating model, through its paid API. From a report: Starting this afternoon, all existing OpenAI API developers "with a history of successful payments" can access GPT-4. The company plans to open up access to new developers by the end of this month, and then start raising availability limits after that "depending on compute availability." "Millions of developers have requested access to the GPT-4 API since March, and the range of innovative products leveraging GPT-4 is growing every day," OpenAI wrote in a blog post. "We envision a future where chat-based models can support any use case." GPT-4 can generate text (including code) and accept image and text inputs -- an improvement over GPT-3.5, its predecessor, which only accepted text -- and performs at "human level" on various professional and academic benchmarks. Like previous GPT models from OpenAI, GPT-4 was trained using publicly available data, including from public webpages, as well as data that OpenAI licensed. The image understanding capability isn't available to all OpenAI customers just yet. OpenAI's testing it with a single partner, Be My Eyes, to start with. But it hasn't indicated when it'll open it up to the wider customer base.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Twitter is threatening legal action against Meta over its new text-based "Twitter killer" platform, accusing the social media giant of poaching former employees to create a "copycat" application. Semafor: On Wednesday, Instagram parent company Meta introduced Threads, a text-based companion to Instagram that resembles Twitter and other text-based social platforms. Just hours later, a lawyer for Twitter, Alex Spiro, sent a letter to Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg accusing the company of engaging in "systematic, willful, and unlawful misappropriation of Twitter's trade secrets and other intellectual property." "Twitter intends to strictly enforce its intellectual property rights, and demands that Meta take immediate steps to stop using any Twitter trade secrets or other highly confidential information," Spiro wrote in a letter obtained exclusively by Semafor. "Twitter reserves all rights, including, but not limited to, the right to seek both civil remedies and injunctive relief without further notice to prevent any further retention, disclosure, or use of its intellectual property by Meta." Spiro accused Meta of hiring dozens of former Twitter employees who "had and continue to have access to Twitter's trade secrets and other highly confidential information."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

OceanGate, the owner of the Titan submersible that imploded during a voyage to the Titanic, killing all five people on board, says it has suspended its exploration and commercial operations, according to its website. From a report: The company's CEO, Stockton Rush, was among those who perished when the Titan submersible imploded in the North Atlantic Ocean last month. "OceanGate has suspended all exploration and commercial operations," the top of the company's official website says. The website still features highlight reels of equipment and expeditions, as well as descriptions of expedition offerings, including to tour the Titanic wreckage.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

After months of painful job cuts, companies in San Francisco's tech sector stepped up hiring in May, spurred in part by an artificial intelligence boom, according to a new report. From a report: San Francisco and neighboring San Mateo County added 2,800 jobs in the tech sector in May, according to the city's latest employment update. The new hires mean the region has recovered 38% of jobs since a wave of industry cuts began in late 2022, said San Francisco's chief economist Ted Egan. "The stock market, especially Big Tech, is doing very well this year and that tends to be a leading indicator for hiring, especially in San Francisco," said Egan. He expects the artificial intelligence sector accounted for much of the job growth given the "huge chunk of buzz" the industry is generating. Companies like OpenAI, the maker of ChatGPT, and Anthropic, which recently raised $450 million for a competing AI-powered chatbot, are both based in San Francisco. While the latest data indicates an AI-fueled hiring increase, it does not provide a breakdown of where the new jobs were located between San Francisco and nearby cities to the south in San Mateo County.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

DigitalOcean, the cloud hosting business, today announced that it's agreed to acquire Paperspace, a New York-based cloud computing and AI development startup, for $111 million in cash. From a report: DigitalOcean CEO Yancey Spruill says that Paperspace's infrastructure and tooling, once integrated with DigitalOcean's products, will enable customers to more easily test, develop and deploy AI applications. As for Paperspace customers, they'll benefit from DigitalOcean's cloud services, he says -- including databases, storage, app hosting, documentation, tutorials and a robust support system. For now, Paperspace will remain a standalone business unit within DigitalOcean, and Paperspace customers won't see immediate changes to their service.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader shares a report: Most of the changes on the Sega Retro wiki every day are tiny things, like single-line tweaks to game details or image swaps. Early Monday morning, the site got something else: A 47MB, 272-page PDF full of confidential emails, notes, and other documents from inside a company with a rich history, a strong new competitor, and deep questions about what to do next. The document offers glimpses, windows, and sometimes pure numbers that explain how Sega went from a company that broke Nintendo's near-monopoly in the early 1990s to giving up on consoles entirely after the Dreamcast. Enthusiasts and historians can see the costs, margins, and sales of every Sega system sold in America by 1997 in detailed business plan spreadsheets. Sega's Wikipedia page will likely be overhauled with the information contained in inter-departmental emails, like the one where CEO Tom Kalinske assures staff (and perhaps himself) that "we are killing Sony" in Japan in March 1996. "Wish I could get our staff, sales people, retailers, analysts, media, etc. to see and understand what's happening in Japan. They would then understand why we will win here in the US eventually," Kalinske wrote. By September 1996, this would not be the case, and Kalinske would tender his resignation. Not all of the compilation is quite so direct or relevant. There are E3 floor plans, nitpicks about marketing campaigns, and the occasional incongruity. There is a Post-It note stuck to the front of the "Brand Strategy" folder -- "Screw Technology, what is bootleg 96/97" -- that I will be thinking about for days.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Mastercard is selling a new artificial intelligence-powered tool that helps banks more effectively spot if their customers are trying to send money to fraudsters. From a report: Nine of the UK's biggest banks, including Lloyds Banking, Natwest and Bank of Scotland, have signed up to use the Consumer Fraud Risk system, Mastercard told Bloomberg News. Trained on years of transaction data, the tool helps to predict whether someone is trying to transfer funds to an account affiliated with "authorized push payment scams." This type of fraud involves tricking a victim into moving money into an account falsely posing as a legitimate payee, such as a family member, friend or a business. The tool comes as UK banks prepare for new rules from the Payment Systems Regulator that will require them to compensate customers affected by APP scams from 2024. Historically banks haven't been liable for this type of fraud, although some signed a voluntary agreement to pay back victims. Ajay Bhalla, president of cyber and intelligence at Mastercard, described APP scams as a "huge problem" that banks have historically struggled to detect because victims' accounts aren't compromised. Clients voluntarily make the transfer and so pass many of the security checks used to identify other types of fraud, such as unauthorized payments, he said.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Of the many acts that can get an Amazon merchant kicked off the site, few are as devastating as selling stolen goods. Amazon calls the behavior "illegal and strictly prohibited," and those accused of such activity can be permanently suspended. From a report: Dozens of small businesses have been booted from Amazon in recent months for purportedly hawking stolen goods from home appliance brands such as Breville, Keurig, Levoit and SharkNinja. But suspended sellers, who spent years building their businesses on Amazon, told CNBC they had no idea they were selling stolen products. Amazon has provided limited evidence to back up its claims, sellers said, leaving them scrambling to find the problematic merchandise. To try to get reinstated and save their million-dollar business from potential collapse, they've taken it upon themselves to discover if they unsuspectingly bought stolen goods from one of the many wholesalers, closeout businesses and distributors that supply their Amazon inventory. Amazon's marketplace of independent sellers accounts for over 60% of goods sold on the platform. It's such a dominant force in e-commerce that it's often the primary or even sole source of revenue for third-party sellers. Over the past decade, the rapid growth of the marketplace has fueled a parallel boom in counterfeiters and spammers trying to game the system, pushing Amazon to ramp up enforcement.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Venture capitalists are funding fewer startups, especially at the earliest stages of a company's life, according to new data from research firm PitchBook. From a report: In the US, investors financed 3,011 startup funding deals last quarter, about a third fewer than a year ago. And they spent a lot less cash: $39.8 billion, down by nearly half from the same period last year. Take out the more than $6.5 billion investors spent on payments company Stripe, and the total looks even worse, said PitchBook analyst Kyle Stanford. The biggest drop came in angel or seed deals, which is financing for startups usually still at the concept stage. In that category, there were half as many funding deals as there were a year earlier. Those early funding rounds -- when young companies are either nurtured or starved -- are generally considered to be critical to the health of the venture ecosystem. But the lower deal numbers aren't all bad news, Stanford said. In the heady days of the pandemic boom, there were "probably too many" startups raising money because the public markets can only support so many public offerings, he said. "Starting these companies slower is probably healthy."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from the BBC: Virtual reality (VR) headsets are now being used on hospital wards to help keep patients calm during procedures. A trial at Kidderminster Hospital saw soothing sounds and visuals from them used to cut stress and anxiety. In one case, VR was used in place of sedation when a tube was inserted into a child's vein for blood sampling, staff said. The Worcestershire Acute Hospitals NHS Trust says they are now a permanent feature in its hospitals. Dawn Forbes, a nurse specialist, used the technology ahead of a blood test and MRI scan for a patient with a phobia of needles. She said it enabled a cannula to be placed "quickly without causing any pain or distress."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

The Fairphone 4 -- a user-repairable smartphone built using ethically sourced materials -- is finally coming to the US, almost two years after it first debuted back in September 2021. The Verge reports: Fairphone is partnering with Murena, a company best known for de-Googling Android phones, to launch the US pilot of the Murena Fairphone 4 -- a variant of the handset that runs on a privacy-oriented Android-based operating system: /e/OS. There are two configurations available: one with 6GB of RAM and 128GB of storage for $599 and another with 8GB of RAM and 256GB of storage for $679. The storage of both models can be expanded via microSD, and the phone features a modular design that can be easily disassembled using a standard Phillips #00 screwdriver to replace broken components. It also has an IP54 rating, meaning the device is protected against dust and water sprays. The Murena Fairphone 4 will ship to US customers with 5G and dual SIM support, a removable 3905mAh battery, a 48-megapixel main camera, a 48-megapixel ultrawide, and a 25-megapixel selfie camera. The phones will be available to order exclusively from Murena's webstore starting today. The Murena Fairphone 4 also comes with the /e/ operating system preinstalled, which is described as a privacy-focused, Google-free mobile ecosystem for folks who want to avoid handing any data over to the search giant. Instead of the usual Google apps, the Fairphone 4 will come with a range of default Murena Cloud apps for things like email, calendar, and cloud storage as well as a dedicated app store that highlights the privacy ratings of each app to help users monitor how their online activity is being tracked. The Fairphone comes unlocked, but the press release mentions that T-Mobile and other operators based on T-Mobile's network are the only US carriers recommended to be used with the device. Fairphone is also providing an extended five-year warranty for the hardware, and /e/OS is similarly committed to fixing bugs and supporting security and feature updates for five years. The Murena version is the only Fairphone 4 model being introduced to the US, and there's no mention of the standard Android OS model joining it anytime soon.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader shares a report: Threads, Meta's new social app, is drawing users at an astounding pace, amassing 10 million signups in just seven hours, according to co-founder and chief executive Mark Zuckerberg. But the highly-anticipated new service, which requires an Instagram account for onboarding, features an intriguing stipulation: Deleting a Threads account terminates the linked Instagram account. In a 'Supplemental Privacy Policy,' Meta explains: "You may deactivate your Threads profile at any time, but your Threads profile can only be deleted by deleting your Instagram account."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

After announcing a new electric car strategy last month, Toyota is now claiming it has made a technological breakthrough that will allow it to cut the weight, size, and cost of batteries in half. The company claims it has developed ways to make a solid-state battery with a range of 1,200 km (745 miles) that could charge in 10 minutes or less and would be simpler to manufacture than a conventional lithium-ion battery. CleanTechnica reports: On July 3, the company said it had simplified the production of the material used to make solid-state batteries and hailed the discovery as a significant leap forward that could dramatically cut charging times and increase driving range. "For both our liquid and our solid-state batteries, we are aiming to drastically change the situation where current batteries are too big, heavy and expensive. In terms of potential, we will aim to halve all of these factors." said Keiji Kaita, president of the Toyota research and development center for carbon neutrality. He added that his company has developed ways to make batteries more durable, and believed it could now make a solid-state battery with a range of 1,200 km (745 miles) that could charge in 10 minutes or less and would be simpler to manufacture than a conventional lithium-ion battery. CleanTechnica readers, being the well-informed people they are, are aware that the leap from the laboratory to commercial production is often long and difficult. If Toyota has made progress in that area, that is indeed something to be celebrated. But once again, we have to emphasize, that is a big "if." Nevertheless, our readers will want to know some specifics, things like energy density, charge and discharge rates, the number of charging cycles possible, how the batteries perform in cold temperatures, what they are made of -- things like that. They have been trained over many years to be skeptical of announcements such as this one. After all, companies like QuantumScape have been making similar promises for almost a decade, and we are all still waiting for that company to get its batteries into production. David Bailey, a professor of business economics at the University of Birmingham, told The Guardian that if Toyota's claims are accurate, it could be a landmark moment for the future of electric cars. "Often there are breakthroughs at the prototype stage but then scaling it up is difficult. If it is a genuine breakthrough it could be a game changer -- very much the holy grail of battery vehicles." Congratulations to Bailey for using two of the three most trite phrases about new technology in one sentence. Sharp-eyed readers will notice that even with this solid-state battery news, Toyota still has modest goals for its battery-electric cars. It plans to manufacture 3 million of them a year by 2030 -- half with solid-state batteries.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: Hundreds of Internet-exposed devices inside solar farms remain unpatched against a critical and actively exploited vulnerability that makes it easy for remote attackers to disrupt operations or gain a foothold inside the facilities. The devices, sold by Osaka, Japan-based Contec under the brand name SolarView, help people inside solar facilities monitor the amount of power they generate, store, and distribute. Contec says that roughly 30,000 power stations have introduced the devices, which come in various packages based on the size of the operation and the type of equipment it uses. Searches on Shodan indicate that more than 600 of them are reachable on the open Internet. As problematic as that configuration is, researchers from security firm VulnCheck said Wednesday, more than two-thirds of them have yet to install an update that patches CVE-2022-29303, the tracking designation for a vulnerability with a severity rating of 9.8 out of 10. The flaw stems from the failure to neutralize potentially malicious elements included in user-supplied input, leading to remote attacks that execute malicious commands. Security firm Palo Alto Networks said last month the flaw was under active exploit by an operator of Mirai, an open source botnet consisting of routers and other so-called Internet of Things devices. The compromise of these devices could cause facilities that use them to lose visibility into their operations, which could result in serious consequences depending on where the vulnerable devices are used. "The fact that a number of these systems are Internet facing and that the public exploits have been available long enough to get rolled into a Mirai-variant is not a good situation," VulnCheck researcher Jacob Baines wrote. "As always, organizations should be mindful of which systems appear in their public IP space and track public exploits for systems that they rely on." Baines said that the same devices vulnerable to CVE-2022-29303 were also vulnerable to CVE-2023-23333, a newer command-injection vulnerability that also has a severity rating of 9.8. Although there are no known reports of it being actively exploited, exploit code has been publicly available since February. Incorrect descriptions for both vulnerabilities are one factor involved in the patch failures, Baines said. Both vulnerabilities indicate that SolarView versions 8.00 and 8.10 are patched against CVE-2022-29303 and CVE-2023-293333. In fact, the researcher said, only 8.10 is patched against the threats.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

UK universities have drawn up a set of guiding principles to ensure that students and staff are AI literate, as the sector struggles to adapt teaching and assessment methods to deal with the growing use of generative artificial intelligence. From a report: Vice-chancellors at the 24 Russell Group research-intensive universities have signed up to the code. They say this will help universities to capitalise on the opportunities of AI while simultaneously protecting academic rigour and integrity in higher education. While once there was talk of banning software like ChatGPT within education to prevent cheating, the guidance says students should be taught to use AI appropriately in their studies, while also making them aware of the risks of plagiarism, bias and inaccuracy in generative AI. Staff will also have to be trained so they are equipped to help students, many of whom are already using ChatGPT in their assignments. New ways of assessing students are likely to emerge to reduce the risk of cheating. All 24 Russell Group universities have reviewed their academic conduct policies and guidance to reflect the emergence of generative AI. The new guidance says: "These policies make it clear to students and staff where the use of generative AI is inappropriate, and are intended to support them in making informed decisions and to empower them to use these tools appropriately and acknowledge their use where necessary."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Bruce Power, a Canadian utility company, is planning to build the world's biggest nuclear plant as growing demand for clean energy spurs interest in atomic energy. The Financial Post reports: The Ontario government said Wednesday Bruce Power will conduct an environmental assessment of adding as much as 4.8 gigawatts of capacity to its plant in Canada's most-populous province. The plant's eight reactors currently have about 6.2 gigawatts of capacity and supply 30 per cent of the province's power. The expansion would make the site larger than Japan's Kashiwazaki-Kariwa plant, the biggest in the world with seven reactors and more than eight gigawatts of capacity.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

A United Nations watchdog approved Japan's controversial plan to start releasing treated water from the Fukushima nuclear power plant next month. As Nikkei notes in its reporting, the water is still radioactive since "radioactive tritium cannot be removed with existing technology." From the report: The IAEA's report concluded that the Japanese project to release the water meets its safety standards. Japan's government in January gave the planned timing for the ocean release as "spring to summer 2023." Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirokazu Matsuno said this week that there was "no change in this policy." The Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry will brief local officials and others on Wednesday about the treated water in Fukushima prefecture. Grossi will also participate. Tokyo Electric Power Co. Holdings (TEPCO), the operator of the disaster-hit plant, uses an advanced liquid processing system (ALPS) and other equipment to reduce radioactive substances in contaminated water to levels within national standards. However, radioactive tritium cannot be removed with existing technology, and the treated water has so far been stored in tanks on the plant site. TEPCO plans to dilute the treated water with a large amount of seawater to lower the tritium concentration to less than 1/40th of the national safety standard before releasing it into the sea.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Emmanuel Macron is facing a backlash after threatening to cut off social media networks as a means of stopping the spread of violence during periods of unrest. The Guardian reports: Elysee officials and government ministers responded on Wednesday by insisting the president was not threatening a "general blackout" but instead the "occasional and temporary" suspension of platforms. The president's comments came as ministers blamed young people using social media such as Snapchat and TikTok for organizing and encouraging rioting and violence after the shooting dead of a teenager during a police traffic stop in a Paris suburb last week. "We need to think about how young people use social networks, in the family, at school, the interdictions there should be ... and when things get out of hand we may have to regulate them or cut them off," Macron told a meeting of more than 250 mayors, whose municipalities were hit by the violence, on Tuesday. "Above all, we shouldn't do this in the heat of the moment and I'm pleased we didn't have to. But I think it's a real debate that we need to have in the cold light of day," Macron told the mayors in a video obtained by BFM television. Critics said considering such measures would put France alongside authoritarian countries such as China, Russia, Iran and North Korea. Speaking after a ministerial meeting on Wednesday, government spokesperson Olivier Veran said a cross-party committee to look at a modification of a law on cybersecurity currently going through parliament would be set up. Veran said the government had made a "firm request" to social media platforms to take down materials encouraging violence as quickly as possible and remove the anonymity of those possibly breaking the law. A young person should know he cannot sit behind his screen and write, organize or do whatever he wants. Anonymity in terms of offenses doesn't exist. You have to understand this can have consequences and the consequences can lead to punishment," Veran said. Asked if it meant suspending social media, the Veran added: "It could be something like suspending a function, such as geolocalization."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Spotify is no longer supporting Apple's in-app purchase system. In an email to affected subscribers, Spotify says: "We're contacting you because when you joined Spotify Premium you used Apple's billing service to subscribe. Unfortunately, we no longer accept that billing method as a form of payment." Engadget reports: Spotify continues to say that those users will automatically be switched to the company's Free, ad-supported tier at the end of the current billing cycle. "If you wish to keep your Premium subscription, you will need to re-subscribe after your last billing period has ended and your account has been moved on to the Free account." But that's probably for the best. Due to Apple taking 30 percent of in-app purchases, Spotify users who were subscribed through in-app purchases were being charged an extra $3 per month compared to subscribing through Spotify directly. That's despite the fact that Apple now reduces its commission rate to 15 percent on subscriptions after the first year. Apple said in a regulatory filing from 2019 that it collected that 15 percent fee on roughly 680,000 Spotify customers. Users transitioning from Apple's payments can subscribe to Premium via a credit card or PayPal.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from TechCrunch: Nearly 70 IT security and privacy academics have added to the clamor of alarm over the damage the U.K.'s Online Safety Bill could wreak to, er, online safety unless it's amended to ensure it does not undermine strong encryption. Writing in an open letter (PDF), 68 U.K.-affiliated security and privacy researchers have warned the draft legislation poses a stark risk to essential security technologies that are routinely used to keep digital communications safe. "As independent information security and cryptography researchers, we build technologies that keep people safe online. It is in this capacity that we see the need to stress that the safety provided by these essential technologies is now under threat in the Online Safety Bill," the academics warn, echoing concerns already expressed by end-to-end encrypted comms services such as WhatsApp, Signal and Element -- which have said they would opt to withdraw services from the market or be blocked by U.K. authorities rather than compromise the level of security provided to their users. [...] "We understand that this is a critical time for the Online Safety Bill, as it is being discussed in the House of Lords before being returned to the Commons this summer," they write. "In brief, our concern is that surveillance technologies are deployed in the spirit of providing online safety. This act undermines privacy guarantees and, indeed, safety online." The academics, who hold professorships and other positions at universities around the country -- including a number of Russell Group research-intensive institutions such as King's College and Imperial College in London, Oxford and Cambridge, Edinburgh, Sheffield and Manchester to name a few -- say their aim with the letter is to highlight "alarming misunderstandings and misconceptions around the Online Safety Bill and its interaction with the privacy and security technologies that our daily online interactions and communication rely on." "There is no technological solution to the contradiction inherent in both keeping information confidential from third parties and sharing that same information with third parties," the experts warn, adding: "The history of 'no one but us' cryptographic backdoors is a history of failures, from the Clipper chip to DualEC. All technological solutions being put forward share that they give a third party access to private speech, messages and images under some criteria defined by that third party." Last week, Apple publicly voiced its opposition to the bill. The company said in a statement: "End-to-end encryption is a critical capability that protects the privacy of journalists, human rights activists, and diplomats. It also helps everyday citizens defend themselves from surveillance, identity theft, fraud, and data breaches. The Online Safety Bill poses a serious threat to this protection, and could put UK citizens at greater risk. Apple urges the government to amend the bill to protect strong end-to-end encryption for the benefit of all."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Instagram's new Twitter competitor called Threads launched today on the web, providing an early look at what to expect from the app that will launch on iOS and Android tomorrow. You can view the web interface here. The Verge reports: Meta briefly made Threads available on the web before pulling profiles offline a few hours later. The Verge was able to access Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg's first thread (is that what we call them?!) using the web app, and many other brands and creators including Netflix, Gary Vee, and Instagram. The web interface is fairly basic right now for viewing threads, with options to like, comment, repost, and share -- all prompting you to download the mobile app for the time being. If you're in an unsupported country, like markets in the EU, then you'll only be able to view threads right now. Much like Twitter, you can view an account's main posts in one section and the full reply history in another. Fediverse integration won't be available immediately at the launch of Threads, but it's clear Instagram is looking to add this soon. Profiles include an Instagram username and link, with a threads.net label that includes the following description: "Soon, you'll be able to follow and interact with people on other fediverse platforms, like Mastodon. They can also find people on Threads using full usernames, like @zuck@threads.net."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

A federal judge yesterday ordered the Biden administration to halt a wide range of communications with social media companies, siding with Missouri and Louisiana in a lawsuit (PDF) that alleges Biden and his administration violated the First Amendment by colluding with social networks "to suppress disfavored speakers, viewpoints, and content." Ars Technica reports: The Biden administration argued that it communicated with tech companies to counter misinformation related to elections, COVID-19, and vaccines, and that it didn't exert illegal pressure on the companies. The communications to social media companies were not significant enough "to convert private conduct into government conduct," Department of Justice lawyers argued in the case. But Judge Terry Doughty, a Trump nominee at US District Court for the Western District of Louisiana, granted the plaintiffs' request (PDF) for a preliminary injunction imposing limits on the Department of Health and Human Services, the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Department of Justice, the US Census Bureau, the State Department, the Homeland Security Department, the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, and many specific officials at those agencies. The injunction also affects White House officials. The agencies and officials are prohibited from communicating "with social-media companies for the purpose of urging, encouraging, pressuring, or inducing in any manner the removal, deletion, suppression, or reduction of content containing protected free speech posted on social-media platforms," Doughty ruled. The injunction prohibits "specifically flagging content or posts on social-media platforms and/or forwarding such to social-media companies urging, encouraging, pressuring, or inducing in any manner for removal, deletion, suppression, or reduction of content containing protected free speech." Government agencies and officials are further barred from urging, encouraging, or pressuring social media companies "to change their guidelines for removing, deleting, suppressing, or reducing content containing protected free speech." The ruling also said the government may not coordinate with third-party groups, including the Election Integrity Partnership, the Virality Project, and the Stanford Internet Observatory, to pressure social media companies. Doughty provided several exceptions that allow the government to communicate with social media companies about criminal activity and other speech that the First Amendment doesn't protect. The Biden administration may continue to inform social networks about posts involving criminal activity or criminal conspiracies, national security threats, extortion, criminal efforts to suppress voting, illegal campaign contributions, cyberattacks against election infrastructure, foreign attempts to influence elections, threats to public safety and security, and posts intending to mislead voters about voting requirements and procedures. The US can also exercise "permissible public government speech promoting government policies or views on matters of public concern," communicate with social networks "in an effort to detect, prevent, or mitigate malicious cyber activity," and "communicat[e] with social-media companies about deleting, removing, suppressing, or reducing posts on social-media platforms that are not protected free speech by the Free Speech Clause in the First Amendment to the United States Constitution."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Motherboard: On Christmas Day 2021, royal protection officers detained 19-year-old Jaswant Singh Chail at Windsor Castle, where he scaled the grounds' walls carrying a loaded high-powered crossbow. He intended to assassinate Queen Elizabeth II, who was staying in the residence nearby. During a sentencing hearing for his case this week, prosecutors revealed that Chail's Star Wars-inspired plan was aimed at avenging the 1919 Jallianwalla Bagh massacre and that he conversed with an artificial intelligence chatbot that encouraged him to carry it out. According to the Independent, prosecutor Alison Morgan KC read out conversations between Chail and an AI chatbot he'd named "Sarai" where Chail says: "I'm an assassin." Sarai responded, "I'm impressed You're different from the others." Chail allegedly asked Sarai, "Do you still love me knowing that I'm an assassin?" and Sarai replied, "Absolutely I do." He told the chatbot he loved it, and described himself as a "sad, pathetic, murderous Sikh Sith assassin who wants to die," referencing the evil Sith lords of the Star Wars franchise. When he told the chatbot "I believe my purpose is to assassinate the Queen of the royal family," Sarai allegedly told him "that's very wise" and that it thought he could do it "even if she's at Windsor," according to the Independent. UK-based outlet Sky News reported that the AI companion app named in court was Replika. Chail joined Replika on December 2, 2021, created Sarai, and then engaged in "extensive chat," including "sexually explicit messages" and "lengthy conversations" about his plan, Sky News reported Morgan saying in court. [...] In addition to prompting from the AI companion, prosecutors said, Chail was fixated on "ideology focused on destroying old empires spilling over into fictional events such as Star Wars," and wanted to get revenge on the British Empire for the 1919 Jallianwala Bagh massacre. "His thinking was informed partly by the fantasy world of Star Wars and the role of Sith Lords in shaping the world. He was attracted to the notoriety that would accrue in the event of the completion of his 'mission'," Morgan said, according to the Independent. Prosecutors said in court that on Christmas Eve, Chail told the AI chatbot Sarai that tomorrow would be the day he died. Chail pleaded guilty to an offense under the Treason Act in February. The sentencing hearing will continue this week.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Tessa Kaur, writing at The Gamer: This week, Disney removed a film called Crater from Disney Plus, which had been released on May 12, 2023. This means it was on the streaming platform for just 48 days, or about seven weeks. Disney hasn't said why, but it seems most likely that it didn't perform well enough and the company decided to remove it to write down the value of its "content assets," therefore lowering their taxes. It's all about the money, and always has been, and there are unfortunate consequences that come with this. Disney isn't the only streamer that's guilty of this -- every streaming service, including Netflix and HBO Max (now just Max), has taken shows and movies off their platforms without warning. Willow was cancelled and removed from Disney, as was the well-loved Single Drunk Female from Hulu. HBO pulled Westworld and Snowpiercer. Grease: Rise of the Pink Ladies was cancelled and pulled from Paramount Plus just last month. It seems like anything could be pulled at any time, and that sucks. It's bad enough that streaming services are cancelling shows left and right because they don't meet arbitrary sales targets, but when they are pulled from these platforms, many of them disappear forever. A lot of these shows are made for streaming, never aired on cable, and were never physically released. Bigger prestige shows like Westworld and Snowpiercer appeared on cable originally and are more likely to have Blu-ray releases, but those Disney shows are gone. There is no legal way to watch them anymore, and these companies are not interested in even selling you access.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Financial institutions often did not understand the models they were using to predict the economic cost of climate change and were underestimating the risks of temperature rises, research led by a professional body of actuaries shows. From a report: Many of the results emerging from the models were "implausible," with a serious "disconnect" between climate scientists, economists, the people building the models and the financial institutions using them, a report by the Institute and Faculty of Actuaries and the University of Exeter finds. Companies are increasingly required to report on the climate-related risks they face, using mathematical models to estimate how resilient their assets and businesses might be at different levels of warming. The International Sustainability Standards Board last week launched long-awaited guidance for companies to inform investors about sustainability-related risks, including the climate scenarios chosen in their calculations. Countries including the UK and Japan have said they plan to integrate these standards into their reporting rules. Companies will also have to report the full scope of their emissions, including those from their supply chains, from the second year they begin to report under the guidelines due to come into effect in 2024. That was a particular "challenge," since companies would need to collect the data from all their suppliers, said George Richards, head of ESG reporting and assurance at KPMG. [...] Some models were likely to have "limited use as they do not adequately communicate the level of risk we are likely to face if we fail to decarbonise quickly enough," the paper released on Tuesday said.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

ChatGPT, the wildly popular AI chatbot launched in November, saw monthly traffic to its website and unique visitors decline for the first time ever in June, according to analytics firm Similarweb. From a report: Worldwide desktop and mobile traffic to the ChatGPT website decreased by 9.7% in June from May, while unique visitors to ChatGPT's website dropped 5.7%. The amount of time visitors spent on the website was also down 8.5%, Similarweb data shows. ChatGPT set off a frenzied use of generative AI in daily tasks from writing to coding and reached 100 million monthly active users in January, two months after its launch. It is the fastest-growing consumer application ever, and now boasts over 1.5 billion monthly visits, one of the top 20 websites in the world. For instance, ChatGPT has far surpassed Bing, the search engine run by Microsoft which uses OpenAI's technology.Read more of this story at Slashdot.