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"The artificial turf industry has had a great deal of success convincing millions of people that its short-lived, nonrecyclable, fossil-fuel-derived product is somehow good for the environment," complains the head of Los Angeles' chapter of the advocacy nonprofit, the Climate Reality Project.In an opinion piece published in the Los Angeles Times, he argues that "In fact, it's clear that artificial turf is bad for our ecosystems as well as our health." The piece's title? "What's more environmentally irresponsible than a thirsty L.A. lawn? A fake plastic one."Artificial turf exacerbates the effects of climate change. On a 90-degree Los Angeles day, the temperature of artificial turf can reach 150 degrees or higher - hot enough to burn skin. And artificial turf is disproportionately installed to replace private lawns and public landscaping in economically disadvantaged communities that already face the greatest consequences of the urban heat-island effect, in which hard surfaces raise local temperatures. Artificial turf consists of single-use plastics made from crude oil or methane. The extraction, refining and processing of these petrochemicals, along with the transporting and eventual removal of artificial turf, come with a significant carbon footprint. Artificial turf is full of perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS, known as "forever chemicals" because they accumulate in the environment and living tissue. The Synthetic Turf Council has noted manufacturers' efforts to ensure that their products "contain no intentionally-added PFAS constituents." So what? Tobacco companies don't intentionally add carcinogens to cigarettes; they're built into the product. PFAS have been linked to serious health effects, and while artificial turf is by no means the only source of them, it is one we can avoid. Because artificial turf is a complex product made of multiple types of plastic, it will never be recycled. After its relatively short lifespan of about eight to 15 years, artificial turf ends up in indefinite storage, landfills and incinerators, creating a whole host of additional pollution problems... Remarkably, artificial turf doesn't even save water compared with grass... [A]rtificial turf must be regularly cleaned with water, and in warm climates such as Los Angeles', artificial fields get so hot that schools must water them down before children play on them. Astroturf also doesn't absorb rainwater, the piece poitns out. In fact, studies show the maintenance costs of artificial turf often exceed those of natural grass. Thanks to Slashdot reader Bruce66423 for sharing the article,Read more of this story at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Guardian: The Australian sea lions glide and dart through underwater tunnels, over seagrass beds and rocky reefs, searching for a meal and dancing with dolphins around a giant bait ball of fish -- all the action captured by a camera stuck on their back. "I can watch this stuff for hours," says Prof Simon Goldsworthy. "It's like the best slow TV ever. You just don't know what you're going to see next." The Australian sea lion is in trouble. They were hunted until the early 20th century. Commercial fishing nets and pots have proved to be a more modern threat. Numbers have crashed by 60% in the past 40 years, leaving only about 10,000 of them mostly spread thinly across 80 breeding sites along Australia's south and west coastline. Goldsworthy's "slow TV" is the result of new efforts to employ the sea lions to map the ocean floor -- and their own habitats -- by sticking cameras with satellite tracking to their backs. So far, eight females from two seal colonies have filmed almost 90 hours of footage across more than 500km, helping scientists to map 5,000 sq km of habitat. The sea lions have mapped rocky reefs and seagrass meadows along the continental shelf, and shown humans the places that are important to them. With that information, conservationists will have much clearer ideas on how to protect the country's only endemic seal. A study outlining the sea lions' camera work has been published in the journal Frontiers in Marine Science.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Longtime Slashdot reader schwit1 shares a report from Ars Technica: The upper stage from a Chinese rocket that launched a batch of Internet satellites Tuesday has broken apart in space, creating a debris field of at least 700 objects in one of the most heavily-trafficked zones in low-Earth orbit. US Space Command, which tracks objects in orbit with a network of radars and optical sensors, confirmed the rocket breakup Thursday. Space Command initially said the event created more than 300 pieces of trackable debris. The military's ground-based radars are capable of tracking objects larger than 10 centimeters (4 inches). Later Thursday, LeoLabs, a commercial space situational awareness company, said its radars detected at least 700 objects attributed to the Chinese rocket. The number of debris fragments could rise to more than 900, LeoLabs said. The culprit is the second stage of China's Long March 6A rocket, which lifted off Tuesday with the first batch of 18 satellites for a planned Chinese megaconstellation that could eventually number thousands of spacecraft. The Long March 6A's second stage apparently disintegrated after placing its payload of 18 satellites into a polar orbit. Space Command said in a statement it has "observed no immediate threats" and "continues to conduct routine conjunction assessments to support the safety and sustainability of the space domain." According to LeoLabs, radar data indicated the rocket broke apart at an altitude of 503 miles (810 kilometers) at approximately 4:10 pm EDT (20:10 UTC) on Tuesday, around 13-and-a-half hours after it lifted off from northern China. At this altitude, it will take decades or centuries for the wispy effect of aerodynamic drag to pull the debris back into the atmosphere. As the objects drift lower, their orbits will cross paths with SpaceX's Starlink Internet satellites, the International Space Station and other crew spacecraft, and thousands more pieces of orbital debris, putting commercial and government satellites at risk of collision.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is exploring the possibility of directly converting radiation from nuclear reactors into electricity using radiovoltaics, a technology that could potentially revolutionize nuclear power generation by moving beyond traditional steam turbine methods. The agency is requesting information and suggestions on this topic in an RFI released on August 1st. Nuclear News reports: There's got to be a better way": Methods to convert the energy of nuclear fission reactions and the decay of radioisotopes into electricity have not evolved since the invention of radioisotope power systems and fission reactors over 70 years ago and remain unoptimized," the RFI says. They rely on thermal heat transfer, and "in each step of this indirect conversion method neutrons, heat, and energy are lost to the shielding material, working fluid, and other system materials." Advanced reactor designs that use alternative coolants, including helium, sodium, and salts, would still use what DARPA calls "heritage nuclear power conversion technology" with water and steam as the working fluids, as would the fusion power plants being planned today. Why now? Tabitha Dodson, the program manager for DARPA DSO, which is launching the RFI, told Nuclear News that "two big things" are driving the interest. "One is the extreme surge of investment in small and advanced nuclear technologies, such as in fusion and space reactors, which do not have a concurrent pairing of advanced power generation methods that doesn't involve liquid-based heat transfer," she said. "Next, there has been an order of magnitude improvement in radiation tolerance and efficiency for voltaics in recent years with encouraging performance that indicates radiovoltaics could scale up as an array usable in nuclear reactors." [...] What is the ask?: The RFI asks: "Is it possible to achieve [a] direct energy conversion nuclear power system, ranging in power from 10s of watts electric (We) to 100s of kWe?" DARPA wants information "on the potential to improve specific power greater than 1 We/kg conversion from watts-thermal per radiation emission product," and information on the potential to improve damage tolerance of the voltaic to nuclear radiation to reach an operating lifetime comparable to the life of its nuclear source, on the scale of decades. "We will learn what our boundary conditions are when respondents tell us what technologies in the field of voltaics are possible, and we'll use that to see if there is sufficient scientific rationale make a case to present for further DARPA investment," Dodson said. "I also hope people are going to start thinking about nuclear systems that use electromagnetic versus thermal-kinetic methods to harvest nuclear energetic reactions."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: Inertial confinement fusion is one method for generating energy through nuclear fusion, albeit one plagued by all manner of scientific challenges (although progress is being made). Researchers at LeHigh University are attempting to overcome one specific bugbear with this approach by conducting experiments with mayonnaise placed in a rotating figure-eight contraption. They described their most recent findings in a new paper published in the journal Physical Review E with an eye toward increasing energy yields from fusion. The work builds on prior research in the LeHigh laboratory of mechanical engineer Arindam Banerjee, who focuses on investigating the dynamics of fluids and other materials in response to extremely high acceleration and centrifugal force. In this case, his team was exploring what's known as the "instability threshold" of elastic/plastic materials. Scientists have debated whether this comes about because of initial conditions, or whether it's the result of "more local catastrophic processes," according to Banerjee. The question is relevant to a variety of fields, including geophysics, astrophysics, explosive welding, and yes, inertial confinement fusion. [...] The problem is that hydrodynamic instabilities tend to form in the plasma state -- Banerjee likens it to "two materials [that] penetrate one another like fingers" in the presence of gravity or any accelerating field -- which in turn reduces energy yields. The technical term is a Rayleigh-Taylor instability, which occurs between two materials of different densities, where the density and pressure gradients move in opposite directions. Mayonnaise turns out to be an excellent analog for investigating this instability in accelerated solids, with no need for a lab setup with high temperature and pressure conditions, because it's a non-Newtonian fluid. "We use mayonnaise because it behaves like a solid, but when subjected to a pressure gradient, it starts to flow," said Banerjee. "As with a traditional molten metal, if you put a stress on mayonnaise, it will start to deform, but if you remove the stress, it goes back to its original shape. So there's an elastic phase followed by a stable plastic phase. The next phase is when it starts flowing, and that's where the instability kicks in." In 2019, Banerjee's team conducted experiments that "involved pouring Hellman's Real Mayonnaise [...] into a Plexiglass container and then creating wavelike perturbations in the mayo," writes Ars' Jennifer Ouellette. "One experiment involved placing the container on a rotating wheel in the shape of a figure eight and tracking the material with a high-speed camera, using an image processing algorithm to analyze the footage. Their results supported the claim that the instability threshold is dependent on initial conditions, namely amplitude and wavelength." "This latest paper sheds more light on the structural integrity of fusion capsules used in inertial confinement fusion, taking a closer look at the material properties, the amplitude and wavelength conditions, and the acceleration rate of such materials as they hit the Rayleigh-Taylor instability threshold."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

After a 7.1 tremor struck southwestern Japan on Thursday, the country's meteorological agency issued its first-ever alert for a possible "megaquake." It marks the first time the warning has been issued under new rules drawn up after a 2011 earthquake, tsunami and nuclear disaster killed almost 20,000 people. Phys.org reports: The JMA's "megaquake advisory" warns that "if a major earthquake were to occur in the future, strong shaking and large tsunamis would be generated." "The likelihood of a new major earthquake is higher than normal, but this is not an indication that a major earthquake will definitely occur during a specific period of time," it added. The advisory concerns the Nankai Trough "subduction zone" between two tectonic plates in the Pacific Ocean, where massive earthquakes have hit in the past. [...] Japan's government has previously said the next magnitude 8-9 megaquake along the Nankai Trough has a roughly 70 percent probability of striking within the next 30 years. In the worst-case scenario 300,000 lives could be lost, experts estimate, with some engineers saying the damage could reach $13 trillion with infrastructure wiped out. "The history of great earthquakes at Nankai is convincingly scary," geologists Kyle Bradley and Judith A Hubbard wrote in their Earthquake Insights newsletter. And "while earthquake prediction is impossible, the occurrence of one earthquake usually does raise the likelihood of another", they explained. "A future great Nankai earthquake is surely the most long-anticipated earthquake in history -- it is the original definition of the 'Big One'."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

The FDA has rejected a first-of-its-kind proposal to use the psychedelic drug MDMA as a treatment for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), according to drugmaker Lykos Therapeutics. NBC News reports: There had been intense political pressure on the FDA to approve the drug. Friday's decision was the first time the agency had considered a Schedule 1 psychedelic for medical use. If approved, it would have been the first new treatment for PTSD in more than two decades. Lykos Therapeutics had asked the FDA to approve the drug as part of a treatment regimen, given alongside talk therapy. The agency's decision came after an independent advisory committee in June declined to recommend approval of the drug, saying there was not enough evidence that the therapy was safe and effective. The committee cited a myriad of concerns, including poorly designed studies, allegations of sexual misconduct during a midstage clinical trial and the potential for serious health risks after taking the drug, including heart problems and abuse. A review by FDA scientists, published ahead of the June meeting, also raised concerns about how the trials were carried out, including that a number of patients and therapists likely were able to guess who was given the medication and who got the placebo. Despite the rejection, experts say they expect that psychedelic therapies are still on their way to FDA approval. There are around four dozen MDMA trials in various stages of clinical development, according to ClinicalTrials.gov. "I think it will be a temporary setback," said Holly Fernandez Lynch, an associate professor of medical ethics at the University of Pennsylvania. "The advisory committee and FDA gave very clear indications of what they're looking for in terms of study design and adverse event reporting, so Lykos and other companies should know pretty clearly how to proceed going forward if they want to get psychedelics approved."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Russia has blocked access to the encrypted Signal messaging app to "prevent the messenger's use of terrorist and extremist purposes." YouTube is also facing mass outages following repeated slowdowns in recent weeks. The Associated Press reports: Russian authorities expanded their crackdown on dissent and free media after Russian President Vladimir Putin sent troops into Ukraine in February 2022. They have blocked multiple independent Russian-language media outlets critical of the Kremlin, and cut access to Twitter, which later became X, as well as Meta's Facebook and Instagram. In the latest blow to the freedom of information, YouTube faced mass outages on Thursday following repeated slowdowns in recent weeks. Russian authorities have blamed the slowdowns on Google's failure to upgrade its equipment in Russia, but many experts have challenged the claim, arguing that the likely reason for the slowdowns and the latest outage was the Kremlin's desire to shut public access to a major platform that carries opposition views.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Wired: Security flaws in your computer's firmware, the deep-seated code that loads first when you turn the machine on and controls even how its operating system boots up, have long been a target for hackers looking for a stealthy foothold. But only rarely does that kind of vulnerability appear not in the firmware of any particular computer maker, but in the chips found across hundreds of millions of PCs and servers. Now security researchers have found one such flaw that has persisted in AMD processors for decades, and that would allow malware to burrow deep enough into a computer's memory that, in many cases, it may be easier to discard a machine than to disinfect it. At the Defcon hacker conference tomorrow, Enrique Nissim and Krzysztof Okupski, researchers from the security firm IOActive, plan to present a vulnerability in AMD chips they're calling Sinkclose. The flaw would allow hackers to run their own code in one of the most privileged modes of an AMD processor, known as System Management Mode, designed to be reserved only for a specific, protected portion of its firmware. IOActive's researchers warn that it affects virtually all AMD chips dating back to 2006, or possibly even earlier. Nissim and Okupski note that exploiting the bug would require hackers to already have obtained relatively deep access to an AMD-based PC or server, but that the Sinkclose flaw would then allow them to plant their malicious code far deeper still. In fact, for any machine with one of the vulnerable AMD chips, the IOActive researchers warn that an attacker could infect the computer with malware known as a "bootkit" that evades antivirus tools and is potentially invisible to the operating system, while offering a hacker full access to tamper with the machine and surveil its activity. For systems with certain faulty configurations in how a computer maker implemented AMD's security feature known as Platform Secure Boot -- which the researchers warn encompasses the large majority of the systems they tested -- a malware infection installed via Sinkclose could be harder yet to detect or remediate, they say, surviving even a reinstallation of the operating system. Only opening a computer's case, physically connecting directly to a certain portion of its memory chips with a hardware-based programming tool known as SPI Flash programmer and meticulously scouring the memory would allow the malware to be removed, Okupski says. Nissim sums up that worst-case scenario in more practical terms: "You basically have to throw your computer away." In a statement shared with WIRED, AMD said it "released mitigation options for its AMD EPYC datacenter products and AMD Ryzen PC products, with mitigations for AMD embedded products coming soon." The company also noted that it released patches for its EPYC processors earlier this year. It did not answer questions about how it intends to fix the Sinkclose vulnerability.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Cisco will cut thousands of jobs in a second round of layoffs this year as the U.S. networking equipment maker shifts focus to higher-growth areas, including cybersecurity and AI, Reuters reported Friday, citing sources. From the report: The number of people affected could be similar to or slightly higher than the 4,000 employees Cisco laid off in February, and will likely be announced as early as Wednesday with the company's fourth-quarter results, said the sources, who were not authorized to speak publicly.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

According to Agrarheute, hackers launched a cyberattack on a Swiss farmer's computer system, disrupting the flow of vital data from a milking robot. Tragically, this led to the death of a cow and her calf. From the report (translated from German into English): According to the CSO, hackers attacked the computers of a farmer from Hagendorn. The dairy farmer's milking robot was also connected to these computers. When the animal owner stopped receiving milking data, he initially suspected a dead zone. But then he learned from the manufacturer of his milking system that he had been hacked. Apparently it was a ransomware attack. The hackers demanded $10,000 to decrypt the data. The farmer considered whether he should give in to the cyber criminals' demands. At first he thought the data on the amount of milk produced was bearable. In addition, the milking robot also worked without a computer or network connection. The cows could therefore continue to be milked. For one cow , however, the cyberattack ended tragically. The farmer normally receives vital data from his cows via the system. This is particularly important and critical for pregnant animals. One cow's calf died in the womb. Because the computer was paralyzed, Bircher was unable to recognize the emergency in time. They tried everything to at least save the cow, but in the end it had to be put down. Overall, the attack caused monetary damages amounting to the equivalent of over 6,400 euros, mainly due to veterinary costs and the purchase of a new computer. However, the hackers came away empty-handed.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Michael Larabel reports via Phoronix: Intel Linux engineer Colin Ian King discovered that if aligning the slab in the ACPI code via the "SLAB_HWCACHE_ALIGN" flag will offer a measurable improvement in memory performance and reducing the kernel boot time. Colin explained with this one line kernel patch: "Enabling SLAB_HWCACHE_ALIGN for the ACPI object caches improves boot speed in the ACPICA core for object allocation and free'ing especially in the AML parsing and execution phases in boot. Testing with 100 boots shows an average boot saving in acpi_init of ~35000 usecs compared to the unaligned version. Most of the ACPI objects being allocated and free'd are of very short life times in the critical paths for parsing and execution, so the extra memory used for alignment isn't too onerous."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: Back in July 2022, when mobile app metrics firm Branch acquired the popular and well-regarded Nova Launcher for Android, the app's site put up one of those self-directed FAQ posts about it. Under the question heading "What does Branch want with Nova?," Nova founder and creator Kevin Barry started his response with, "Not to mess it up, don't worry!" Branch (formerly/sometimes Branch Metrics) is a firm concerned with helping businesses track the links that lead into their apps, whether from SMS, email, marketing, or inside other apps. Nova, with its Sesame Search tool that helped users find and access deeper links -- like heading straight to calling a car, rather than just opening a rideshare app -- seemed like a reasonable fit. Barry wrote that he had received a number of acquisition offers over the years, but he didn't want to be swallowed by a giant corporation, an OEM, or a volatile startup. "Branch is different," he wrote then, because they wanted to add staff to Nova, keep it available to the public, and mostly leave it alone. Two years later, Branch has left Nova Launcher a bit too alone. As documented on Nova's official X (formerly Twitter) account, and transcripts from its Discord, as of Thursday Nova had "gone from a team of around a dozen people" to just Barry, the founder, working alone. The Nova cuts were part of "a massive layoff" of purportedly more than 100 people across all of Branch, according to now-former Nova workers. Barry wrote that he would keep working on Nova, "However I have less resources." He would need to "cut scope" on an upcoming Nova release, he wrote. Other employees noted that customer support, marketing, and even correspondence would likely be strained or disappear. "While Nova is not dead (despite mine and others' eulogistic tones), it's certainly not positioned to launch bold new features or plot new futures," writes Ars' Kevin Purdy, in closing. "Here's hoping Barry can make a go of Nova Launcher for as long as it's viable for him."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

The FCC has proposed new rules governing the use of AI-generated phone calls and texts. Part of the proposal centers on create a clear definition for AI-generated calls, with the rest focuses on consumer protection by making companies disclose when AI is being used in calls or texts. A report adds: "This provides consumers with an opportunity to identify and avoid those calls or texts that contain an enhanced risk of fraud and other scams," the FCC said. The agency is also looking ensure that legitimate uses of AI to assist people with disabilities to communicate remains protected.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Major U.S. companies are tightening eligibility requirements for student discounts, cracking down on graduates who continue to claim benefits years after leaving school. Amazon, Spotify, and other firms are partnering with verification services like SheerID to validate student status, ending an era of lax enforcement that allowed many to exploit discounts long after graduation. While companies aim to build brand loyalty among young consumers, they're also guarding against fraud. SheerID claims it helped clients avoid $2 billion in fraudulent discounts last year. Most streaming services retain over 90% of student customers after graduation, according to SheerID CEO Stephanie Copeland Weber. "They're building trust and loyalty with those consumers," she told WSJ.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

There's a rot at the heart of modern software development that's destroying innovation, and infosec legend Moxie Marlinspike believes he knows exactly what's to blame: Agile development. Marlinspike argued that Agile methodologies, widely adopted over the past two decades, have confined developers to "black box abstraction layers" that limit creativity and understanding of underlying systems. "We spent the past 20 years onboarding people into software by putting them into black box abstraction layers, and then putting them into organizations composed of black box abstraction layers," Marlinspike said. He contended this approach has left many software engineers unable to do more than derivative work, lacking the deep understanding necessary for groundbreaking developments. Thistle Technologies CEO Window Snyder echoed these concerns, noting that many programmers now lack knowledge of low-level languages and machine code interactions. Marlinspike posited that security researchers, who routinely probe beneath surface-level abstractions, are better positioned to drive innovation in software development.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Stressing science education, China is outpacing other countries in research fields like battery chemistry, crucial to its lead in electric vehicles. From a report: China's domination of electric cars, which is threatening to start a trade war, was born decades ago in university laboratories in Texas, when researchers discovered how to make batteries with minerals that were abundant and cheap. Companies from China have recently built on those early discoveries, figuring out how to make the batteries hold a powerful charge and endure more than a decade of daily recharges. They are inexpensively and reliably manufacturing vast numbers of these batteries, producing most of the world's electric cars and many other clean energy systems. Batteries are just one example of how China is catching up with -- or passing -- advanced industrial democracies in its technological and manufacturing sophistication. It is achieving many breakthroughs in a long list of sectors, from pharmaceuticals to drones to high-efficiency solar panels. Beijing's challenge to the technological leadership that the United States has held since World War II is evidenced in China's classrooms and corporate budgets, as well as in directives from the highest levels of the Communist Party. A considerably larger share of Chinese students major in science, math and engineering than students in other big countries do. That share is rising further, even as overall higher education enrollment has increased more than tenfold since 2000. Spending on research and development has surged, tripling in the past decade and moving China into second place after the United States. Researchers in China lead the world in publishing widely cited papers in 52 of 64 critical technologies, recent calculations by the Australian Strategic Policy Institute reveal.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

OpenAI's latest AI model, GPT-4o, exhibits unusual behaviors, including voice cloning and random shouting, according to a new "red teaming" report. The model, which powers ChatGPT's Advanced Voice Mode alpha, is OpenAI's first trained on voice, text, and image data. In high-noise environments, GPT-4o occasionally mimics users' voices, a quirk OpenAI attributes to difficulties processing distorted speech. The company said it has implemented a "system-level mitigation" to address this issue. The report also reveals GPT-4o's tendency to generate inappropriate vocalizations and sound effects when prompted.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Bruce66423 writes: Sellafield [U.K.'s largest nuclear site] has apologised after pleading guilty to criminal charges relating to a string of cybersecurity failings at Britain's most hazardous nuclear site, which it admitted could have threatened national security. Among the failings at the vast nuclear waste dump in Cumbria was the discovery that 75% of its computer servers were vulnerable to cyber-attacks, Westminster magistrates court in London heard. Information that could threaten national security was left exposed for four years, the nuclear watchdog revealed, and Sellafield said it had been performing critical IT health checks that were not, in fact, being carried out. The Guardian's investigation also revealed concerns about external contractors being able to plug memory sticks into Sellafield's system while unsupervised and that its computer servers were deemed so insecure that the problem was nicknamed Voldemort after the Harry Potter villain because it was so sensitive and dangerous. The good news is that the problem has been spotted. The bad news is that there can be no meaningful punishment for a government owned company. One can only hope that they will do better in the future.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Microsoft researchers said on Friday that Iran government-tied hackers tried breaking into the account of a "high ranking official" on the U.S. presidential campaign in June, weeks after breaching the account of a county-level U.S. official. From a report: The breaches were part of Iranian groups' increasing attempts to influence the U.S. presidential election in November, the researchers said in a report that did not provide any further detail on the "official" in question. The report follows recent statements by senior U.S. Intelligence officials that they'd seen Iran ramp up use of clandestine social media accounts with the aim to use them to try to sow political discord in the United States. Iran's mission to the United Nations in New York told Reuters in a statement that its cyber capabilities were "defensive and proportionate to the threats it faces" and that it had no plans to launch cyber attacks.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Toxic PFAS "forever chemicals" that leach from landfills into groundwater are among the major pollution sources in the US, and remain a problem for which officials have yet to find an effective solution. Now new research has identified another route in which PFAS may escape landfills and threaten the environment at even higher levels: the air. From a report: PFAS gas that emits from landfill waste ends up highly concentrated in the facilities' gas treatment systems, but the systems are not designed to manage or destroy the chemicals, and much of them probably end up in the environment. The findings, which showed up to three times as much PFAS in landfill gas as in leachate, are "definitely an alarming thing for us to see," said Ashley Lin, a University of Florida researcher and the lead author of the study. "These findings suggest that landfill gas, a less scrutinized byproduct, serves as a major pathway for the mobility of PFAS from landfills," the paper's authors wrote. PFAS are a class of about 16,000 compounds used to make products resistant to water, stains and heat. They are called "forever chemicals" because they do not naturally break down and have been found to accumulate in humans. The chemicals are linked to cancer, birth defects, liver disease, thyroid disease, plummeting sperm counts and a range of other serious health problems. As researchers have begun to understand the chemicals' dangers in recent years, the focus has largely been on water pollution, and regulators have said virtually all leachate from the nation's 200 landfills contain PFAS. But scientists are beginning to understand that PFAS air pollution is also a significant threat.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader writes: Netflix and Crunchyroll titles leaked on Thursday, with full episodes of shows released on social media including the anticipated "Heartstopper" Season 3 and anime fare like "Arcane" and the Season 3 premiere of "Re:Zero." The leak was first reported internationally, as fans spotted clips of unfinished footage on social media, "One of our post-production partners has been compromised and footage from several of our titles has unfortunately leaked online," a Netflix spokesperson said in a statement exclusively to TheWrap Thursday night. "Our team is aggressively taking action to have it taken down."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Signal developer Moxie Marlinspike criticized early encryption software's user-unfriendly design at Black Hat 2024, admitting he and others initially failed to consider non-technical users' needs. Speaking with Black Hat founder Jeff Moss, Marlinspike said developers of tools like Pretty Good Privacy (PGP) wrongly assumed users would adopt complex practices like running keyservers and signing keys over dinner. "We were just wrong," Marlinspike said, describing this as "software snobbery" that undermined wider adoption. "You take on the complexity instead of making the user deal with it," Marlinspike contrasted PGP's arcane interface with Signal's more accessible design.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

The first therapy that uses gene-editing is to be offered on the NHS in a "revolutionary breakthrough" for patients. From a report: It will be used as a potential cure for the blood disorder beta thalassaemia. Stem cells which make blood will be extracted, reprogrammed to correct the condition and returned to the patient's body. It could spare them needing a blood transfusion, every three to five weeks, for life. People with beta thalassaemia struggle to produce enough haemoglobin, which is the protein in red blood cells that carries oxygen around the body. It is a genetic disease that is passed down through families and caused by defects in the body's instructions for manufacturing haemoglobin. It can leave people severely tired, weak, and short of breath and also cuts life expectancy.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

QuakeCon 2024 kicks off today with the announcement of enhanced remasters of the first two Doom games, which will feature online cross-platform deathmatch, co-op support for up to 16 players, upgraded visuals, and additional content including a new episode for Doom 2. The compilation, titled DOOM + DOOM 2, runs on the KEX Engine and will include new maps, a newly-updated soundtrack, and support for 4K resolution, with a possible free upgrade for existing console owners. IGN reports: While unconfirmed, it appears that console owners who already own DOOM or DOOM 2 will get the upgrade for free. It's currently available for purchase on Xbox Series X/S for $9.99, though it has been pulled from the Steam store. When it's released, DOOM + DOOM 2 will be perhaps the most comprehensive version of the venerable shooters to date. You can watch the trailer here.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Security researcher Grant Smith uncovered a large-scale smishing scam where scammers posing as the USPS tricked victims into providing their credit card details through fake websites. Smith hacked into the scammers' systems, gathered evidence, and collaborated with the USPS and a US bank to protect over 438,000 unique credit cards from fraudulent activity. Wired reports: The flood of text messages started arriving early this year. They carried a similar thrust: The United States Postal Service is trying to deliver a parcel but needs more details, including your credit card number. All the messages pointed to websites where the information could be entered. Like thousands of others, security researcher Grant Smith got a USPS package message. Many of his friends had received similar texts. A couple of days earlier, he says, his wife called him and said she'd inadvertently entered her credit card details. With little going on after the holidays, Smith began a mission: Hunt down the scammers. Over the course of a few weeks, Smith tracked down the Chinese-language group behind the mass-smishing campaign, hacked into their systems, collected evidence of their activities, and started a months-long process of gathering victim data and handing it to USPS investigators and a US bank, allowing people's cards to be protected from fraudulent activity. In total, people entered 438,669 unique credit cards into 1,133 domains used by the scammers, says Smith, a red team engineer and the founder of offensive cybersecurity firm Phantom Security. Many people entered multiple cards each, he says. More than 50,000 email addresses were logged, including hundreds of university email addresses and 20 military or government email domains. The victims were spread across the United States -- California, the state with the most, had 141,000 entries -- with more than 1.2 million pieces of information being entered in total. "This shows the mass scale of the problem," says Smith, who is presenting his findings at the Defcon security conference this weekend and previously published some details of the work. But the scale of the scamming is likely to be much larger, Smith says, as he didn't manage to track down all of the fraudulent USPS websites, and the group behind the efforts have been linked to similar scams in at least half a dozen other countries.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: The past several years have been absolute scorchers, with 2023 being the warmest year ever recorded. And things did not slow down in 2024. As a result, we entered a stretch where every month set a new record as the warmest iteration of that month that we've ever recorded. Last month, that pattern stretched out for a full 12 months, as June of 2024 once again became the warmest June ever recorded. But, despite some exceptional temperatures in July, it fell just short of last July's monthly temperature record, bringing the streak to a close. Europe's Copernicus system was first to announce that July of 2024 was ever so slightly cooler than July of 2023, missing out on setting a new record by just 0.04 degrees C. So far, none of the other major climate trackers, such as Berkeley Earth or NASA GISS, have come out with data for July. These each have slightly different approaches to tracking temperatures, and, with a margin that small, it's possible we'll see one of them register last month as warmer or statistically indistinguishable. According to the Copernicus system, July 2024 was 0.68 degrees above the average temperature for July from 1991 to 2020. It also included the warmest day ever recorded. In terms of anomalies, July 2024 also represents the first time in a year that a month was less than 1.5 degrees C above preindustrial temperatures (defined as the average from 1850-1900).Read more of this story at Slashdot.

FTX has been ordered to pay $12.7 billion in relief to its customers, according to the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC). In a statement, CFTC Chairman Rostin Behnam said the crypto exchange drew customers in with "an illusion that it was a safe and secure place to access crypto markets," then misappropriated their customer deposits to make its own risky investments. Reuters reports: The repayment order implements a settlement between the CFTC and the bankrupt crypto exchange, which has committed to a bankruptcy liquidation that will repay customers whose deposits were locked during its late 2022 collapse. FTX has said that its customers will receive 100% recovery on their claims against the company, based on the value of their accounts at the time it filed for bankruptcy. The CFTC agreement resolves a potential roadblock to that repayment, ensuring that the government's lawsuit against FTX will not reduce the funds available to its customers. The CFTC agreed not to collect any payment from FTX until all its customers are repaid, with interest. The CFTC settlement requires FTX to pay $8.7 billion in restitution and $4 billion in disgorgement, which will be used to further compensate victims for losses suffered during the exchange's collapse. [...] FTX is currently soliciting votes on its bankruptcy proposal but faces opposition from some customers who feel short-changed by the decision to repay them based on much-lower cryptocurrency prices from November 2022. Votes are due on Aug. 16, and FTX intends to seek final approval of its wind-down plan on Oct. 7.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Dan Robinson writes via The Register: Hyperscalers are forecast to account for more than 60 percent of datacenter space by 2029, a stark reversal on just seven years ago when the majority of capacity was made up of on-premises facilities. This trend is the result of demand for cloud services and consumer-oriented digital services such as social networking, e-commerce and online gaming pushing growth in hyperscale bit barns, those operated by megacorps including Amazon, Microsoft and Meta. The figures were published by Synergy Research Group, which says they are drawn from several detailed quarterly tracking research services to build an analysis of datacenter volume and trends. As of last year's data, those hyperscale companies accounted for 41 percent of the entire global data dormitory capacity, but their share is growing fast. Just over half of the hyperscaler capacity is comprised of own-build facilities, with the rest made up of leased server farms, operated by providers such as Digital Realty or Equinix. On-premises datacenters run by enterprises themselves now account for 37 percent of the total, a drop from when they made up 60 percent a few years ago. The remainder (22 percent) is accounted for by non-hyperscale colocation datacenters. What the figures appear to show is that hyperscale volume is growing faster than colocation or on-prem capacity -- by an average of 22 percent each year. Hence Synergy believes that while colocation's share of the total will slowly decrease over time, actual colo capacity will continue to rise steadily. Likewise, the proportion of overall bit barn space represented by on-premise facilities is forecast by Synergy to decline by almost three percentage points each year, although the analyst thinks the actual total capacity represented by on-premises datacenters is set to remain relatively stable. It's a case of on-prem essentially standing still in an expanding market.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

According to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman (paywalled), Apple plans to launch a completely redesigned Mac mini with M4 and M4 Pro chips later this year. MacRumors reports: The new Mac mini will be the first major design change to the machine since 2010, making it Apple's smallest ever desktop computer. The new Mac mini will apparently approach the size of an Apple TV, but it may be slightly taller than the current model, which is 1.4 inches high. It will continue to feature an aluminum shell. Individuals working on the new device apparently say that it is "essentially an iPad Pro in a small box." Apple is said to have tested Mac mini models with at least three USB-C ports on the back, as well as an area for the power cable and an HDMI port. There will continue to be two versions of the Mac mini: one with the standard M4 chip, similar to the iPad Pro, and one with an M4 Pro chip. The base model is set to begin shipping from suppliers this month ahead of release later in the year, while the high-end model will not be ready until October.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Guardian: Amazon's $4 billion investment into US artificial intelligence startup Anthropic is to be examined in the latest investigation into technology tie-ups by the UK's competition watchdog. The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) said on Thursday that it was launching a preliminary investigation into the deal, before deciding whether to refer it for an in-depth review. The deal, announced in March, included a $4 billion investment in Anthropic from Amazon, and a commitment from Anthropic to use Amazon Web Services "as its primary cloud provider for mission critical workloads, including safety research and future foundation model development." The regulator said it was "considering whether it is or may be the case that Amazon's partnership with Anthropic has resulted in the creation of a relevant merger situation." "We are an independent company. Our strategic partnerships and investor relationships do not diminish our corporate governance independence or our freedom to partner with others," said an Anthropic spokesperson said in a statement. "Amazon does not have a seat on Anthropic's board, nor does it have any board observer rights. We intend to cooperate with the CMA and provide them with a comprehensive understanding of Amazon's investment and our commercial collaboration."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

"Sonos is delaying two hardware releases originally planned for later this year as it deploys an all-hands-on-deck approach to fixing the app," writes The Verge's Chris Welch. The company released a redesigned mobile app on May 7th that has been riddled with flaws and missing features. Sonos also entered the crowded headphone market in May with the launch of its Ace headphones, but it was immediately "overshadowed" by problems with the new Sonos app, according to Sonos CEO Patrick Spence. The Verge reports: "I will not rest until we're in a position where we've addressed the issues and have customers raving about Sonos again," Spence said during the afternoon earnings call. "We believe our focus needs to be addressing the app ahead of everything else," he continued."This means delaying the two major new product releases we had planned for Q4 until our app experience meets the level of quality that we, our customers, and our partners expect from Sonos." One of those two products is almost certainly Sonos' next flagship soundbar, codenamed Lasso, which I revealed last month. "These products were ready to ship in Q4," Spence said in response to a question on the call. He also went in-depth on the app issues and how Sonos plans to fix them. Spence remains adamant that overhauling the app and its underlying infrastructure "was the right thing to do" for the company's future; the new app "has a modular developer platform based on modern programming languages that will allow us to drive more innovation faster," he said. But Spence also now acknowledges that the project was rushed. "With the app, my push for speed backfired," he said. "As we rolled out the new software to more and more users, it became evident that there were stubborn bugs we had not discovered in our testing. As a result, far too many of our customers are having an experience that is worse than what they previously had." [...] For now, Sonos is turning to some longtime experts for help. "I've asked Nick Millington, the original software architect of the Sonos experience, to do whatever it takes to address the issues with our new app," Spence said. Sonos board member Tom Conrad is helping to oversee the app improvement effort and "ensure" things stay on the right track.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

The Russian Chess Federation is suspending a player who is facing jail time for allegedly trying to poison her rival with mercury during a chess tournament. Chess.com reports: Amina Abakarova, a 40-year-old chess coach from Makhachkala in the Russian Republic of Dagestan, is accused of trying to poison her rival, 30-year-old Umayganat Osmanova. The incident unfolded during the Dagestan Chess Championship on August 2, according to a Telegram channel that first reported on the story, and is now making headlines in state-run Russian news media as well as reaching global media as well. Security camera footage shows the incident where Abakarova calmly walked over to the board where Osmanova was supposed to appear 20 minutes later. It was reported that she'd previously asked if cameras were in operation and been told that they weren't. She then smeared what is said to be potentially deadly mercury from a thermometer. Osmanova said she began feeling unwell 30 minutes later, complaining of nausea and dizziness, prompting an immediate call for medical assistance. Doctors eventually concluded that poisoning was a likely cause. After reviewing the footage from security cameras, the arbiter reported it to the police and Abakarova was detained, rtv1.com reports. [...] Abakarova has reportedly confessed that she wanted to "knock her opponent out of the tournament," admitting "personal hostility" toward Osmanova, who had a week earlier won the Dagestan Rapid Championship above her on tiebreaks. The plan was not to harm Osmanova, but to scare her, according to a police report quoted by Russian media. Abakarova has now been detained by police and is facing up to three years in jail, according to The Mirror. Andrey Filatov, the President of the Russian Chess Federation, has also confirmed that Abakarova is temporarily suspended from Russian chess events, pending an investigation into the incident. She is potentially facing a lifetime ban. [...] Despite falling ill, Osmanova fully recovered and continued the tournament, eventually finishing in second place and winning a prize. Abakarova was expelled after the fourth round and is unlikely to play chess again anytime soon.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from TechCrunch: In a newly published paper titled "Achieving Human Level Competitive Robot Table Tennis," Google's DeepMind Robotics team is showcasing its own work on the game. The researchers have effectively developed a "solidly amateur human-level player" when pitted against a human component. During testing, the table tennis bot was able to beat all of the beginner-level players it faced. With intermediate players, the robot won 55% of matches. It's not ready to take on pros, however. The robot lost every time it faced an advanced player. All told, the system won 45% of the 29 games it played. "This is the first robot agent capable of playing a sport with humans at human level and represents a milestone in robot learning and control," the paper claims. "However, it is also only a small step towards a long-standing goal in robotics of achieving human level performance on many useful real world skills. A lot of work remains in order to consistently achieve human-level performance on single tasks, and then beyond, in building generalist robots that are capable of performing many useful tasks, skillfully and safely interacting with humans in the real world." The robot's biggest trouble areas are responding to fast balls, high and low balls. It also has trouble with backhand and the ability to read the spin on an incoming ball. Here's how the researchers plan to address the issue with fast balls: "To address the latency constraints that hinder the robot's reaction time to fast balls, we propose investigating advanced control algorithms and hardware optimizations. These could include exploring predictive models to anticipate ball trajectories or implementing faster communication protocols between the robot's sensors and actuators."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Apple on Thursday announced changes to its Digital Markets Act (DMA) compliance plan for the European Union, as the tech giant faces an ongoing investigation by the European Commission for suspected non-compliance. The revised rules, set to roll out this fall, ease restrictions on developers' ability to promote external offers within iOS apps. Developers can now inform users about offers available beyond their own websites, including on other apps and marketplaces, without adhering to Apple-mandated templates. Apple has also introduced a new fee structure for purchases made through external links. An "Initial Acquisition Fee" of 5% will apply to new users' first-year purchases, while a "Store Services Fee" of 10% (or 5% for smaller developers) will be charged on subsequent transactions. These changes replace the controversial Core Technology Fee, which is currently under EU scrutiny. Spotify and Epic aren't satisfied with the changes. Spotify has called the new plan "unacceptable," arguing it disregards DMA requirements. Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney labeled it "malicious compliance" involving "junk fees."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

China's rapid deployment of robotaxis is raising concerns among the country's 7 million ride-hailing drivers, who fear job losses as autonomous vehicles hit the streets, according to a Reuters report. At least 19 Chinese cities are conducting robotaxi trials, with seven approving tests without human monitors. Baidu's Apollo Go plans to deploy 1,000 vehicles in Wuhan by year-end and operate in 100 cities by 2030. The push for self-driving technology aligns with President Xi Jinping's call for "new productive forces," but contrasts sharply with the more cautious approach in the United States. As robotaxi fleets proliferate, some drivers worry about their livelihoods, with one Wuhan driver predicting "everyone will go hungry."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Another study is raising concern about the safety of the widely used sugar alcohol sweetener erythritol, a low-calorie sugar substitute found in "keto-friendly" foods, baked goods and candies. From a report: Researchers from the Cleveland Clinic compared erythritol to typical sugar and found only erythritol caused worrisome cardiovascular effects. Although the study was small, it's the first head-to-head look at people's blood levels after they consume products with erythritol or sugar (glucose). "We compared the results, and glucose caused none of the problems," said Dr. Stanley Hazen, a cardiologist at the Cleveland Clinic and the lead author of the study, published Thursday morning in the journal Arteriosclerosis, Thrombosis, and Vascular Biology. Erythritol is one ingredient on a growing list of nonsugar sweeteners found in low-calorie and sugar-free foods. Erythritol and xylitol are sugar alcohols that are sweet like sugar but with far fewer calories. Erythritol is often mixed with another sweetener, stevia, and xylitol is often found in gum, mouthwash and toothpaste. Earlier studies from Hazen's lab -- one published last year and the other in June -- found potential links between the sugar alcohols and an increased risk of heart attacks and strokes. The research suggested both sugar alcohols might make blood platelets stickier and therefore more susceptible to clotting and blocking veins or arteries, in turn contributing to heart attacks and strokes. For the new research, Hazen's team analyzed the heart effects of erythritol and regular sugar -- in this case, simple glucose -- by enrolling two groups of healthy middle-aged male and female volunteers: 10 who consumed the erythritol and 10 who consumed sugar.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Privacy removal services fail to effectively scrub personal data from people-search websites, a Consumer Reports (CR) study [PDF] revealed Thursday. The four-month investigation found these services eliminated only 35% of volunteers' identifying information profiles across 13 people-search sites. Manual opt-outs proved most effective, removing 70% of profiles within a week.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

ICON, a construction technology company, is nearing completion of 100 3D-printed homes in Wolf Ranch, Texas, using a massive robotic printer. The 45-foot-wide, 4.75-ton Vulcan printer began constructing the walls of what ICON claims is the world's largest 3D-printed community in November 2022. The printer extrudes a concrete mixture layer by layer, creating corduroy-textured walls. ICON senior project manager Conner Jenkins told Reuters the process is faster and more efficient than traditional construction, requiring fewer workers and reducing material waste. The single-story homes, priced between $450,000 and $600,000, feature concrete walls resistant to water, mold, termites, and extreme weather. However, homeowners reported weak wireless signals due to the thick walls, necessitating mesh internet routers. ICON, which printed its first home in Austin in 2018, is also developing lunar construction systems for NASA's Artemis program.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Apple is set to implement stricter controls on screen recording permissions in its upcoming macOS Sequoia release this fall. Users will be required to grant explicit permission weekly and after each reboot for apps needing screen access, 9to5Mac reports. From the report: Multiple developers who spoke to 9to5Mac say that they've received confirmation from Apple that this is not a bug. Instead, Apple is indeed adding a new system prompt reminding users when an app has permission to access their computer's screen and audio.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Palantir Chief Technology Officer Shyam Sankar has called for faster defense spending, arguing the Pentagon should focus on rapid deployment over higher budgets. "The biggest challenge is speed," Sankar told Axios in an interview. "The Department of Defense would be better off spending half as much money twice as quickly." The U.S. military has "lost our ability to value time," he said. The Denver-based software company, known for its work in areas ranging from vaccine logistics to Ukraine demining efforts, has positioned itself as a "software prime" in the defense sector.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader shares a report: I'm not sure I knew of anyone, Borderlands fan or not, who believed that the movie adaptation of the game was going to be good, based on everything from casting to trailers. Now as reviews come in ahead of its release tomorrow, those fears have been validated. And then some. As I write this, the Borderlands movie has a flat 0% on Rotten Tomatoes. No positive reviews whatsoever, and the ones that are in are not just negative, but brutal.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Nasdaq is taking steps to purge itself of dubious companies whose shares trade below $1 each, following criticism that the exchange has become home to hundreds of risky penny stocks. From a report: [...] When a stock closes below $1 for 30 consecutive trading days, Nasdaq deems the company to be noncompliant and gives it 180 days to remedy the situation. After 180 days, if the stock hasn't climbed above $1, the company can request another 180-day grace period. At the end of that second period, the company can still get a last-minute reprieve by appealing to a Nasdaq hearings panel. The delisting is stayed while the company awaits its hearing. Some say those rules are lax, leading to a pileup of penny stocks on Nasdaq. On Wednesday, there were 523 stocks listed on U.S. exchanges that closed below $1 per share, of which 433 were listed on Nasdaq, according to Dow Jones Market Data. By comparison, there were fewer than a dozen sub-$1 stocks in early 2021. The two proposed rule changes unveiled by Nasdaq on Thursday would tighten up some of the rules regarding sub-$1 stocks, though they don't go as far as Virtu has demanded. Under one of the proposed changes, companies that reach the end of their second 180-day grace period wouldn't be able to postpone delisting by seeking an appeal. Instead, their shares would move to the over-the-counter market -- a sort of purgatory where companies land after being delisted -- while they await the appeal. Effectively, the rule change caps the amount of time that sub-$1 stocks can be listed on Nasdaq to roughly a year. The second proposed rule change would speed up the delisting process for companies that recently did a reverse stock split. Under the change, if a company carried out a reverse split to prop up its share price, but then its stock fell below $1 within a year, Nasdaq would immediately send the company a delisting notice. The company could still appeal and remain listed for another 180 days.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

ADT confirmed this week that it was recently hacked, compromising some customer data. From a report: The home security company did not say when the cyberattack and data breach occurred, but disclosed that the attackers accessed the company's databases containing customer home addresses, email addresses, and phone numbers. In a brief regulatory filing published late Wednesday, ADT said it has "no reason to believe" that customer home security systems were compromised during the incident, but ADT did not say how it reached that conclusion. The statement said a "small percentage" of customers are affected, but did not provide a more specific number. As of June 2024, ADT said it had six million customers.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) has agreed to reserve the .internal top-level domain so it can become the equivalent to using the 10.0.0.0, 172.16.0.0 and 192.168.0.0 IPv4 address blocks for internal networks. From a report: Those blocks are reserved for private use by the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority, which requires they never appear on the public internet. As The Register reported when we spotted the proposal last January, ICANN wanted something similar but for DNS, by defining a top-level domain that would never be delegated in the global domain name system (DNS) root. Doing so would mean the TLD could never be accessed on the open internet -- achieving the org's goal of delivering a domain that could be used for internal networks without fear of conflict or confusion. ICANN suggested such a domain could be useful, because some orgs had already started making up and using their own domain names for private internal use only. Networking equipment vendor D-Link, for example, made the web interface for its products available on internal networks at .dlink. ICANN didn't like that because the org thought ad hoc TLD creation could see netizens assume the TLDs had wider use -- creating traffic that busy DNS servers would have to handle. Picking a string dedicated to internal networks was the alternative. After years of consultation about whether it was a good idea -- and which string should be selected -- ICANN last week decided on .internal. Any future applications to register it as a global TLD won't be allowed.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from TorrentFreak: In Brazil, there was a [...] unbelievable display of public piracy last week that went on to make national headlines. The mayor of the municipality Acopiara, in the north-east of the country, invited citizens of the small town Trussu to join a screening of the blockbuster "Inside Out 2" at the local town square. With little more than a thousand inhabitants, many of whom have limited means, this appeared to be a kind gesture. The mayor, Anthony Almeida Neto, could use some positive marks too; he was removed from office three times on suspicion of being involved in corruption schemes, and was most recently reinstated in March. The mayor officially announced the public screening of 'Inside Out 2' via Instagram and Facebook, inviting people to join him. That worked well as a sizable crowd showed up, allowing the controversial mayor to proudly boast the event's popularity in public through his social media channels. Taking place in an outside theater created just for this occasion, the screening was a unique opportunity for the small town's residents. There are no official movie theaters nearby, so locals would normally have to travel for several hours to see a film that's still in cinemas. Thanks to the mayor, people could see 'Inside Out 2' in their hometown instead. The mayor was pleased with the turnout too and proudly broadcasted it through a livestream on Instagram. Amidst all this joy, however, people started to notice a watermark on the film that was clearly associated with piracy. In addition, it was apparent that the copy had been sourced from pirate streaming site, Obaflix. All signs indicate that the public event wasn't authorized or licensed. Instead, it appeared to be an improvised screening of a low-quality TS release of the film, which is widely available through pirate sites. When this 'revelation' was picked up in the Brazilian press, mayor Anthony Almeida was quick to respond with assurances that he only had honest intentions.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Nikhilesh De writes via CoinDesk: A federal judge ordered Ripple to pay $125 million in civil penalties and imposed an injunction against future securities law violations on Wednesday. District Judge Analisa Torres, of the Southern District of New York, imposed the fine (PDF) after finding that 1,278 institutional sale transactions by Ripple violated securities law, leading to the fine. The $125.035 million fine is well below the $1 billion in disgorgement and prejudgment interest and $900 million in civil penalties the SEC sought. Wednesday's order on remedies follows the judge's July 2023 ruling in the case itself, finding that Ripple violated federal securities laws through its direct sale of XRP to institutional clients, though she also ruled that Ripple's programmatic sales of XRP to retail clients through exchanges did not violate any securities laws. The SEC tried unsuccessfully to appeal that portion of the ruling while the case was ongoing.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

The founder of Cambridge-based Riverlane, Steve Brierley, predicts quantum computing will have its "Sputnik" breakthrough within years. "Quantum computing is not going to be just slightly better than the previous computer, it's going to be a huge step forward," he said. Phys.org reports: His company produces the world's first dedicated quantum decoder chip, which detects and corrects the errors currently holding the technology back. In a sign of confidence in Riverlane's work and the sector in general, the company announced on Tuesday that it had raised $75 million in Series C funding, typically the last round of venture capital financing prior to an initial public offering. "Over the next two to three years, we'll be able to get to systems that can support a million error-free operations," said Earl Campbell, vice president of quantum science at Riverlane. This is the threshold where a quantum computer should be able to perform certain tasks better than conventional computers, he added. Quantum computers are "really good at simulating other quantum systems", explained Brierley, meaning they can simulate interactions between particles, atoms and molecules. This could open the door to revolutionary medicines and also promises huge efficiency improvements in how fertilizers are made, transforming an industry that today produces around two percent of global CO2 emissions. It also paves the way for much more efficient batteries, another crucial weapon in the fight against climate change. "I think most people are more familiar with exponential after COVID, so we know how quickly something that's exponential can spread," said Campbell, inside Riverlane's testing lab, a den of oscilloscopes and chipboards. [...] While today's quantum computers can only perform around 1,000 operations before being overwhelmed by errors, the quality of the actual components has "got to the point where the physical qubits are good enough," said Brierley. "So this is a super exciting time. The challenge now is to scale up... and to add error correction into the systems," he added. Such progress, along with quantum computing's potential to crack all existing cryptography and create potent new materials, is spurring regulators into action. "There's definitely a scrambling to understand what's coming next in technology. It's really important that we learn the lessons from AI, to not be surprised by the technology and think early about what those implications are going to be," said Brierley. "I think there will ultimately be regulation around quantum computing, because it's such an important technology. And I think this is a technology where no government wants to come second."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader quotes a report originally published by Business Insider: A Chinese state-backed company has launched its first 18 satellites in its bid to build a vast orbital network aimed at rivaling Starlink, according to local media. The launch on Monday by Shanghai Spacecom Satellite Technology involved 18 satellites and one rocket, per The China Securities Journal, which is run by state news agency Xinhua. According to the outlet, the rocket lifted off from the Taiyuan satellite and missile launch center in Shanxi province. These satellites mark the first step in the company's effort to create a 15,000-strong network of Low Earth Orbit satellites, which the firm has dubbed the "Thousand Sails Constellation." The company said it plans to reach that final tally by 2030, per The China Securities Journal. Domestic media has widely called the project the Chinese version of Starlink, which runs about 6,000 satellites. Elon Musk has said that he plans to eventually host a network of 42,000 satellites. The Thousand Sails Constellation, also known as the G60 project, is one of three planned major satellite networks in the country. Each is expected to field 10,000 or more satellites. Most are anticipated to orbit between 200 and 1,200 miles above the Earth's surface, which is also where Starlink satellites are generally found. The three constellations, along with dozens of ambitious space projects from other Chinese firms, have been fueled by a recent push from the central government to loop the private sector into its science and technology goals.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

"The Royal Mint, which has produced coins since the 9th Century, has begun to recover gold from electronic waste as the use of cash has declined and fewer new coins are needed," writes Slashdot reader newcastlejon. "In 2022, construction began on a new site in Llantrisant, Wales. This facility will now be used to initially produce gold for jewelry and later for commemorative coins." The BBC reports: At the Royal Mint plant, piles of circuit boards are being fed into the new facility. First, they are heated to remove their various components. Then the array of detached coils, capacitors, pins and transistors are sieved, sorted, sliced and diced as they move along a conveyor belt. Anything with gold in it is set aside. The gold-laden pieces go to an on-site chemical plant. They're tipped into a chemical solution which leaches the gold out into the liquid. This is then filtered, leaving a powder behind. It looks pretty nondescript but this is actually pure gold -- it just needs to be heated in a furnace to be transformed into a gleaming nugget. "Traditional gold recovery processes are very energy intensive and use very toxic chemicals that can only be used once, or they go to high energy smelters and they're basically burnt," says Leighton John, the Royal Mint's operations director. "The groundbreaking thing for us is the fact that this chemistry is used at room temperature, at very low energy, it's recyclable and pulls gold really quickly." "Our aim is to process over 4,000 tonnes of e-waste annually," says Leighton John. "Traditionally this waste is shipped overseas but we're keeping it in the UK and we're keeping those elements in the UK for us to use. It's really important." The report notes that the UK is the second biggest producer of tech trash per capita, beaten only by Norway. According to the UN, e-waste is a rapidly growing problem, with 62 million tons discarded in 2022. That's expected to increase by a third by 2030.Read more of this story at Slashdot.