The Register

Yeah, and about how it got that data on 20 million people for that research... A study of 20 million LinkedIn users over five years has raised a few eyebrows as it involved quietly analyzing people's connection suggestions to see how that would reflect in their career paths.…

We're pulling in billions, let me check down the back of the sofa TikTok faces a £27 million fine ($29 million ... for the moment, at least) following a British government investigation that found the Chinese media giant may have breached UK data protection laws and failed to protect children's privacy.…

He always wanted to fight in the military – are his draft papers on the way? Edward Snowden, the former NSA contractor and self-described whistleblower, has been granted Russian citizenship.…

Government may foot up to 40% of the bill for a fab that runs on time As Intel looks to expand its rebooted foundry empire, the x86 giant's next chip plant may be an advanced packaging facility in the northern Italy.…

It'll reduce emissions a bunch, but stress the grid even more First it came for internal combustion engines, and now the California Air Resources Board (CARB) is proposing a phase out of natural gas water heaters and furnaces – another first among US states.…

Founder of firm at center of fraud claims he's 'not running' right now. Ditched the Fitbit, have you? Korean prosecutors say they have obtained an international wanted persons notice from Interpol to help them find Terraform Labs crypto exec Kwon Do-hyung, aka Do Kwon.…

From small town in North Dakota with a crime problem to file-scrambling nasty Organizations are being warned about a wave of attacks targeting Microsoft SQL Server with ransomware known as Fargo, which encrypts files and threatens victims that their data may be published online if they do not pay up.…

BAE Systems, Malloy Aeronautics team on UK's Brimstone II precision missile work A UK-designed missile being used extensively by Ukrainian forces is getting a new delivery method: A giant quadcopter drone able to carry 300kg (661 lbs) while maintaining a range of 30km (18 miles). …

Not all investors happy that suits get more time to earn significant stock-option awards Not all execs are created equal and those of the Oracle variety remain among the highest paid due to an extension to performance-based stock options that gives them more time to achieve corporate goals.…

Nice sentiment considering power-hungry components, but it's not a lot of cash in DC terms The US Department of Energy is stumping up $42 million in funding for projects to reduce the amount of energy used for cooling in datacenters as part of the government's overarching goal of reaching net zero carbon dioxide emissions by 2050.…

Agency watching forecast before making decision to rollback the SLS, but not doing so would be risky Updated Rocket fans will have to stow the popcorn once again because NASA's rescheduled launch of Artemis I this week has been stood down.…

With censorship looming, US wants to bring internet, communications companies into fray The US Treasury announced last Friday it was issuing a General License that provides some exemptions to Iran sanctions for internet and communication services in an effort to damper censorship.…

Mozilla may seem like it has forgotten, but this is the most customizable browser going There are tons of choices in web browsers, and we're not going to try to persuade you that any particular one is the best. However, Chrome's ever-climbing market share suggests that a lot of people don't know how to get the best out of their browser, because there are still quite a few things you can't readily achieve in Chrome that are straightforward in Firefox and its relatives.…

While one vendor says they help prepare for audit, expert warns they don't defend compliance Oracle has begun to verify software tools from third-party vendors designed to monitor the licensing of Java products in enterprise environments, prompting a warning from one expert.…

Language wars, huh, what are they good for? Opinion Rust is eating into our systems. The first Rusted drivers are being welded into Linux, while Microsoft's Azure CTO Mark Russinovich said C/C++ – until now, the systems languages of choice – should be dropped in favor of Rust henceforth. …

Fake BSOD became tool of revenge when a staffer ignored the sensible rules of seniority Who, Me? Welcome to the working week and therefore to a new instalment of “Who, Me?”, The Register's confessional in which readers reveal and defend their darkest deeds.…

Plus: ML career help, OpenAI releases free speech-recognition model, and more news In brief AI probably won't replace software engineers, but will dramatically change the way they work in the future especially if they can instruct machines using natural language to generate code.…

Culture wars may have come to gentle tales of tweens enjoying friends, fun, and programming Books aimed at encouraging tween girls to code appear to have been removed from classrooms in Pennsylvania's Central York School District.…

Ukrainian outfit Respeecher's GAN-based neural audio enhancer embraces The Dark Side James Earl Jones, the actor who has voiced iconic Star Wars villain Darth Vader since 1977, has reportedly permitted his past utterances to be fed into an AI that will ensure his distinct tones become replicable once he becomes one with the Force.…

It's mostly a channel program with a fancy name, plus more outposts Alibaba Cloud last week staged its annual gabfest and revealed some tasty new cloud services, as well as a billion dollar "ecosystem upgrade" aimed at finding more customers outside China.…

Hails unusually smooth development process despite travel complications Linux kernel boss Linus Torvalds has offered the community an optimistic prediction that version 6.0 of the project will debut next week.…

PLUS: Warnings on Chinese payment schemes; AWS brushes up its Cantonese; Hong Kong ponders digital dollar; and more! Asia In Brief India's government last week released a draft telco law that defines all over-the-top services as telecoms providers and therefore makes them subject to the same regulations imposed on carriers.…

'One of the most dangerous and active malware developers operating at the moment' Crooks spreading the Noberus ransomware are adding weapons to their malware to steal data and credentials from compromised networks.…

What a mine field Analysis Gamers may not have to fight off cryptocurrency miners or pay scalped prices to get their hands on a GPU now, especially if they're willing to pick up an Nvidia 30-series or AMD 6000-series card…

We chat to the scientists involved in first-of-its-kind mission Feature On Monday, September 26 at 2314 UTC, scientists at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory in America, and those monitoring ground-based telescopes across our planet, will be celebrating something usually associated with failure in space missions.…

Has someone been Poettering about? Linux distros running on Windows in a WSL2 virtual machine now can use the systemd init system.…

If you've got no OS of your own, you've got little chance to compete, Firefox maker sighs Firefox maker Mozilla is taking aim at Microsoft, Google, and Apple for using their operating systems to steer users to their browsers and stacking the deck against rivals who lack the same OS advantages. Like, for instance, Mozilla.…

Nothing screams Land of the Free like the government ordering you to host awful but lawful content The State of Florida has asked the US Supreme Court to affirm that its social media law SB 7072, which bars online platforms from removing speech they don't want, meets constitutional free speech guarantees.…

Cor, that's a shot in the arm for this upstart CPU ISA RISC-V chip biz SiFive says its processors are being used to manage AI workloads to some degree in Google datacenters.…

A day in the G is like a day on the farm. Every meal a banquet. Every code checkout a parade. I love the G Updated Challenged by questions about Google's cost-cutting at an internal meeting, Alphabet billionaire CEO Sundar Pichai reportedly reassured employees about the internet giant's financial belt tightening by insisting that workplace fun doesn't have to be about money.…

'At least ten' people didn't declare coin income. Wow, what a bust The IRS has been granted a court order to collect records from a bank the agency said will help it identify US taxpayers who failed to report taxable income from crypto trades. …

Even those with older devices will have to sign in if they want to activate new features As part of its takeover of Fitbit, Google will begin requiring customers to use Google accounts to manage their fitness-tracking devices, reigniting privacy concerns over the acquisition in 2019.…

Subscribers have questions – like 'When were you going to tell us?' Updated Australian telecommunications company Optus has fallen victim to a significant cyberattack and data breach.…

Ex-CEO also on the hook for $1m after skipping over known software issues Boeing has agreed to pay $200 million to settle charges brought by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) claiming the aviation giant misled investors about the safety of its 737 MAX airplane.…

Also: New 'magnet of threats' attackers and FBI has details on Iran's online incursion into Albania Iran is experiencing a near-total internet service disruption in the west and intermittent interruptions nationwide, with access to Instagram, Whatsapp and some mobile networks being blocked, says Netblocks.…

But a median of 60Mbps is not to be sniffed at when you're out in the sticks Elon Musk's Starlink satellite broadband service has seen a decline in download speeds around the world as more and more subscribers sign up, perhaps making the company a victim of its own success.…

You know you're working, your colleagues know you're working, but the boss? Survey says: Paranoid The vast majority of employees working remotely are satisfied with their output but employers still don't know just how fruitful their staff are when away from the office, leading to "productivity paranoia."…

COVID-19, the Russian invasion of Ukraine, growing inflation, and the threat of recession driving adoption Businesses can cut the cost of maintaining ageing enterprise software in half with judicious use of third-party support vendors, according to research outfit Gartner.…

Wasp-like technique could be used to 3D-print structures in that remote place you plan to retire in Flying robots could be the answer to the challenge of building structures in remote locations or hard-to-reach spots, according to engineers who have developed a drone-based approach to 3D printing.…

Controversial reforms ditched but expert notes HMRC thinks 90% don't comply The UK government has announced plans to repeal the controversial reform to off-payroll taxation, a set of rules which applied to IT contractors who move between companies.…

Servers sure to sport AMD's Epyc Genoa or Intel's Sapphire Rapids but certain specs still under wraps Lenovo has a wave of over 50 products and services coming to coincide with the 30th anniversary of ThinkSystem servers, including AMD and Intel-based hardware, edge systems, storage arrays and a unified management platform.…

Four fresh dates organized for industrial action as union puts the squeeze on biz Tens of thousands of BT Group engineers and call center workers, including those who handle emergency calls, are scheduled to go on strike for a total of four days next month in a long-running pay dispute.…

Some drip forgot to tell the designers until the renovation had begun On-Call If it's Friday it must be time for another episode of On Call, The Register's weekly column celebrating readers' escapes from nasty scrapes.…

If you could stop storing records on people unconnected to any crimes, that would be great An EU watchdog says rules that allow Europol cops to retain personal data on individuals with no links to criminal activity go against Europe's own data privacy protections, not to mention undermining the regulator's powers and role.…

Bosses' bad behavior may, just may, have derailed crucial warehouse vote Amazon is running out of time to answer allegations from an American watchdog that it unlawfully suppressed labor organizers at one of its warehouses in New York. …

Ad goliath reckons complaint is meritless – but it would, wouldn't it? Meta was sued on Wednesday for alleged undisclosed tracking and data collection in its Facebook and Instagram apps on Apple iPhones.…

Thanks for the advice DeepMind has trained a chatbot named Sparrow to be less toxic and more accurate than other systems, by using a mix of human feedback and Google search suggestions.…

Musk fumes at NHTSA 'recall' of a million-plus cars Tesla owners ought to check for firmware updates, or risk their windows proving to be less than (h)armless.…

Maybe we don't want to go with the netflow, man US government agencies have been buying, to some degree, details of Americans' internet activities from data brokers – and US Senator Ron Wyden (D-OR) wants an explanation.…

While issuing an emergency patch for Endpoint Configuration Manager Data-stealing spyware disguised as a banking rewards app is targeting Android users, Microsoft's security team has warned.…