The Register

At the same time, tools like Github Copilot and Facebook InCoder make developers believe their code is sound Computer scientists from Stanford University have found that programmers who accept help from AI tools like Github Copilot produce less secure code than those who fly solo.…

Suggests VMware might not allow NICs and HBAs other than Broadcom’s, which would be a bizarre act +COMMENT The European Commission has opened what it describes as an “an in-depth investigation” into Broadcom’s acquisition of VMware.…

DNA Center Appliances shipped since September may spoil Christmas with inaccurate reports of dead disks Sorry to do this to you, dear reader, but here’s another item for your pre-holiday to-do list: update firmware on any Cisco DNA Center appliances you’ve acquired since September.…

Will stay on as boss of servers and software – the fun bits, in other words Poll Elon Musk has made good on his promise to abide by the results of a Twitter poll that asked whether he should quit as CEO of the microblogging service – and delivered a resounding “YES” vote.…

20m downloads can't be wrong? Or can they? Parental control apps may do more harm than good, according to researchers who found 18 bugs in eight Android apps with more than 20 million total downloads that could be exploited to, among many nefarious acts, control other devices on the parents' network.…

Leader of the the world's largest contract chip manufacturer would like it if the two world powers could work out their differences As TSMC plans to spend $40 billion to build two chip manufacturing plants in the US, the Asian foundry giant's CEO is bemoaning the way America's growing rift with China has messed with the global semiconductor industry.…

At $349 it's a cheap computer and a not-very-expensive keyboard If you thought unicorn puke was the epitome of keyboard bling, Finalmouse's upcoming Centerpiece keyboard may see you rethink that assessment.…

Criminals have noticed that spreadsheet's XLL files add custom functionality - including malware It took a few years and one temporary halt, but in July Microsoft finally began blocking certain macros by default in Word, Excel, and PowerPoint, cutting off a popular attack vector for those who target users of Microsoft's Windows OS and Office suite.…

Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor lack of gas will stay these NGDVs from carbon-free completion of their appointed rounds The United States Postal Service announced today that "at least" three quarters of its planned fleet of next generation delivery vehicles (NGDVs) would be electric, marking a sharp departure from fossil fuel-heavy fleet plans announced in 2021.…

Heavily armed US police turning up on the doorstep is no laughing matter Two men have been charged with an alleged week-long US swatting spree in which they used stolen Yahoo email credentials to break into Ring door cameras, livestream the events on social media, and then taunt responding police officers.…

Scheme allegedly allowed taxi drivers to bypass airport waiting line for $10 fee Two men have been charged for allegedly conspiring with Russian hackers to manipulate the taxi dispatch system at New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport.…

Beijing's 'military-civil fusion' doctrine suffers multi-billion dollar blowback US chip sanctions against China have tag-teamed with a weaker economy to vaporize a chunk of the wealth held by the Middle Kingdom's richest semiconductor business owners.…

Bold move, Cotton. Let's see how that plays out for them Amazon has avoided being charged with breaking EU law and a fine of up to $50 billion by making several commitments to the European Commission today, one of which was to allow Prime sellers to "freely choose any carrier" for their logistics and delivery services.…

Insert your Trojan joke here Security researchers at Microsoft have discovered a bug in macOS that lets malicious apps bypass Apple's Gatekeeper security software "for initial access by malware and other threats." …

Compass, protractor and map not required to triangulate lunar coordinates NASA scientists are developing an AI to help future astronauts traverse the Moon's surface without the aid of satellite fixes, instead relying on landmarks to pinpoint lunar location.…

Much money for Amazon, that is. Bezos heads to dockside after doomed JEDI deal Amazon Web Services has secured a five-year contract with the US Navy for cloud services, just weeks after scoring its share of a major US Department of Defense deal for cloud computing.…

It also boasts MemTest86+ 6, which now can boot and run on UEFI machines SystemRescue 9.06 may only be a point release, but it has some good stuff including the newly released Xfce, MemTest86+ version 6, and a new USB-key-writing tool.…

Flight computers down for 2 hours worldwide 'and no BA plane can file a flight plan? Seems not ideal' British Airways flights have been grounded into Tuesday morning due to issues with flight planning software that caused aircraft to be held on the tarmac instead of being able to take off as scheduled.…

Doesn't it make your current migration at work look like a walk in the park though Regulators in the UK have fined TSB Bank a total of £48.6 million ($60 million) for a botched platform migration which in 2018 cost the financial services firm £200 million.…

But gas likely to find a 'big niche' in rail, aviation, shipping, and industry Hydrogen is not likely to be practically and economically viable for mass use in the short and medium term for heating homes or fueling passenger cars, a report from UK Members of Parliament has concluded.…

Meanwhile the next-gen Linux filesystems are going nowhere fast The forthcoming Linux kernel 6.2 should see improved filesystem handling, including performance gains for SD cards and USB keys, as well as FUSE. As for the next-gen storage subsystems… not so much.…

Alleged 'mastermind' who proposed 'take the money and run' exit strategy remains a fugitive "What is OneCoin?" asks the narrator of a YouTube video. "Millions of people around the world are mining OneCoin today. The reason? It's a platform for innovation that changes the financial industry."…

Central hub will make things smoother and safer but not store details The European Commission last week proposed rules governing the use of Advance Passenger Information in a bid to strengthen border security.…

All those expensive gadgets the boffins attached to it, they couldn't afford a feather duster? In a year during which AI started making art and conversation, the question of whether a robot can make you cry with a tweet seems very apt.…

Picture your avatar wearing a logo-emblazoned shirt driving past a billboard touting a product Microsoft appears to be expanding its push to place ads throughout different products to online games.…

Collab obviously goes deep – accessing DigiLocker requires use of national identity service Google has integrated the Indian government's cloud storage service into Android – a feat that weaves the national ID system and government documents deeply into the search giant's OS.…

A notable misstep as the iPhone supplier looks to grow its chip-making footprint Foxconn plans to sell its controversial stake in Chinese chip-making giant Tsinghua Unigroup, but that reportedly won't stop Taiwan's government from fining the iPhone supplier for buying shares in the first place.…

Educator gets an F for security Misconfigured Amazon Web Services S3 buckets belonging to McGraw Hill exposed more than 100,000 students' information as well as the education publishing giant's own source code and digital keys, according to security researchers.…

Unlike Oracle and Google, this time there's no heatwave to blame Alibaba Cloud lost its cool over the weekend after a refrigeration failure rendered several services unavailable at one of the cloud provider's Hong Kong availability zones.…

More AI is the answer to all our woes, Meta CTO says Another Meta datacenter is in limbo after the company announced it was pausing construction of a $1.5 billion bitbarn under development in Huntsville, Alabama.…

Microsoft issues a workaround for problem while it works on a fix Some users running Windows 10 who installed the KB5021233 cumulative update this month are seeing their operating system crash with the Blue Screen of Death, Microsoft is warning.…

Slowly inching toward E2EE Google has added client-side encryption for some email customers, allowing enterprise and education Gmail users to send and receive encrypted messages.…

Someone thought of the children, and the dark patterns Updated The owner of Fortnite is paying the FTC an Epic amount of cash after a pair of unanimous 4-0 decisions found it guilty of violating children's privacy and tricking customers into making unwanted purchases.…

Happy New Year! Concession is made on GPUs and other parts Those fearing that graphics cards could see a significant price increase due to US tariffs returning for certain Chinese components can take a sigh of relief — for now.…

Part missile, part spy plane, all Mach 5+ and coming in 2028, maybe The US Air Force has awarded $334 million to defense contractor Leidos to develop the next phase in its hypersonic arsenal: An unmanned craft meant for super-speed spying dubbed "Mayhem." …

Thirsty officials drained of arguments after media outlet legal battle to free the information Google has disclosed how much water its datacenters consume, following a legal battle between a local media outlet and the city of The Dalles in Oregon, which sought to keep the information confidential.…

Salads recalled after consumers report hallucinations, dilated pupils, and worse Some 130 salad fans in Australia got more than they bargained for when picking up grub where contaminated baby spinach was an ingredient – including hallucinations and delirium.…

The lions shall lie down with the lamb on 'cross-industry' Speedometer v.3 Apple, Google and Mozilla are teaming up to develop a new version of the Speedometer browser benchmark that they say will score web browser performance in a novel way: one that reflects user journeys, not under-the-hood streamlining. …

Believes Facebook Marketplace broke EU rules by 'distorting competition' for online ads The European Commission has a problem with Meta tying its online classified ads service, Marketplace, to the Facebook social network, and is concerned it is "imposing unfair trading conditions on Facebook Marketplace's competitors for its own benefit."…

No longer 'a definitive date' for facility scheduled to be built from next year Intel is set to delay construction of its planned semiconductor manufacturing plant at Magdeburg in Germany, and is said to be seeking further public subsidies for the project, citing increased costs as one reason for the rethink.…

Founder and bossman asks if WFH freedoms to blame Salesforce founder and soon-to-be sole CEO Marc Benioff says newbies on the payroll are being less productive and he is trying to get a better handle on why this might be, asking staff if the lack of office time is a contributing factor.…

Study measures wrong things, fails to offer an accurate picture of tax regime, say consultants Two-fifths of organizations hired fewer off-payroll staff under the new IR35 rules in September 2021 than in March 2020, according to research published by UK tax collector HMRC, yet critics claims the findings fail to measure the true impact of the reforms.…

Existing hold ups already cost millions as UK authority fails to put a price on latest setback Surrey County Council has suffered another delay to the implementation of its protracted and accident prone £30 million ERP project that will, at some point, see it switch systems from SAP to Unit4.…

CityFibre seethes that move comes straight out of 'dominant operator ... playbook' Openreach has revealed new wholesale pricing for fiber-to-the-premises (FTTP), offering more discounts for internet service providers (ISPs) to encourage a migration of consumers to fiber broadband connections.…

One version to bind them all, and in the darkness rock them Opinion If you're not a musician, you may never think of MIDI, the Musical Instrument Digital Interface standard that links up keyboards and other electronic noise boxes. Firefox has, adding the super-niche Web MIDI API in its latest version. That's one of those "uh, OK" decisions which gets weirder the longer you look at it – but then, MIDI is utterly unlike other tech standards.…

The ayes have it: You said 'YES' Updated Elon Musk may be about to fire himself as CEO of Twitter.…

One dumb downtime-inducing panic is survivable. The second is a career-killer Who, Me? Once again, gentle readerfolk, it is time for the Reg's weekly confessional – Who, Me? in which we recount readers' technical anti-triumphs. This one follows on from recent tales of big red buttons, and goes one better.…

Hundreds of millions of cases expected to bring new waves of disruption One of COVID-19's many side effects was to disrupt the technology industry's supply chains – especially when they linked to China.…

Plus: Suomi security warnings and artists rebel against AI on Artstation In Brief The squishy brains behind OpenAI's artificial ones are predicting developments like the ChatGPT system will see money flooding in – with a forecast of earning around $1 billion by 2024.…

Is Zuck's org doomed, or is this a case of a techie struggling with management? Legendary developer John Carmack has quit his role as a consultant to Meta, where he worked as an executive consultant on its Oculus virtual reality hardware.…