The Register

Python is not the be-all and end-all of writing smart algorithms Machine learning is fast becoming one of the high-growth areas for developers – but what language should you employ, given that so many exist?…

Using bcache to speed Linux 4.14? Stop if you want your data to live A filesystem-eating bug has been found in Linux 4.14.…

Ad giant has malware detection in its script-hosting service... but Coin Hive isn't flagged Crypto-jackers using Coin Hive code to secretly mine Monero via computing power supplied by the unsuspecting have found Google Tag Manager to be a convenient means of distribution.…

Read-only doom-day slips, December axe still ohovers Even a turkey can get a reprieve: Microsoft's CodePlex shut-down date has run late, but is still imminent.…

Personal gear a more reliable moneymaker than servers. Who knew? On a day when Meg Whitman, CEO of its sibling HPE, announced her departure from the biz, HP Inc revealed its slow and steady progress in two tough markets.…

iGiant didn't want to aid censorship, but $10bn in revenue is $10bn in revenue Apple has told the US government it cooperated with China's demands to block VPN services so it could get other concessions from the Middle Kingdom on human rights.…

More than 20 pulls a day on his desk, v.4.15 bloating and a Thanksgiving trip to pack for made Linus testy Linux overlord Linus Torvalds has apologised – a bit – for calling some security-centric kernel contributors “f*cking morons”.…

Dept. of Justice lamely says 'winter is coming' for Behzad Mesri, aka 'Skote Vahshat' The United States' Department of Justice has identified a suspect in July's attack on Home Box Office, naming an Iranian national, Behzad Mesri, in an indictment unsealed Tuesday, November 21.…

VMware-certified partners will help as Redmond also starts vSphere-to-Azure migrations Microsoft has announced it will offer “the full VMware stack on Azure hardware” with the help of an as-yet-unnamed VMware partner.…

This bug is a feature in 11 out of 12 scenarios Microsoft has rebutted analysis that suggested its Address Space Layout Randomisation (ASLR) technology could be exploited.…

War over Java spills into mobile privacy world Analysis Having evidently forgotten about that Street View Wi-Fi-harvesting debacle, Google has admitted constantly collecting the whereabouts of Android devices regardless of whether or not they have location tracking enabled.…

And it happened a year ago, hoped you wouldn't find out Uber's CEO Dara Khosrowshahi today revealed hackers broke into the ride-hailing app's databases and stole personal information on 57 million passengers and drivers – information including names, email addresses, and phone numbers.…

Stock tumbles, sales sag, profits wiped out, boss ejects Hewlett Packard Enterprise boss Meg Whitman is stepping down, and will be replaced on February 1 by company president Antonio Neri.…

Pai will lay out plan this week, vote in December Analysis Ajit Pai, chairman of America's broadband watchdog, today confirmed what we all knew was coming for months now: a move to tear up the Obama-era's rules on network neutrality in the US.…

First profit in two years, fresh funding, new faces FalconStor has confirmed its first profit in more than two years, bagged fresh funding and employed a new bunch of new faces in its exec lounge.…

Matt Hancock blissfully unaware that deal is on brink of collapse UK digital minister Matt Hancock has denied that talks with BT to improve poor internet speeds in 1.4 million rural areas have fallen through.…

The Chocolate Factory plugs accessibility fudge Mobile app developers are being forced to rewrite their code as Google attempts to tame Android's Wild West.…

The hybrid Arm-Intel Mac draws near One day we'll look back and wonder why it took PCs so long to move from RISC chips that had to pretend to be CISC chips to RISC chips that didn't have to pretend to be anything.…

Others reckon Chancellor's taking it a bit too far... Over the weekend, chancellor Philip Hammond boasted that “fully driverless cars” would be on Britain’s roads in four years’ time. Some in the driverless car industry think this is a dangerous fantasy, while more high-profile driverless car software companies are all in favour of it.…

DL385 blasts SPEC benchmark HPE has upgraded its Opteron-using DL385p server with AMD Epyc processors and used it to notch up a pair of record SPEC benchmarks.…

Survey reveals GDPR training and investment is on the rise Multinationals whose data protection compliance was rubberstamped by the UK's privacy regulator have been assured they won't be stripped of the authorisation after Brexit.…

Brit biz bosses, improve your infosec. We'll handle Russia The chief exec of the National Cyber Security Centre – a branch of the UK's spy nerve-centre GCHQ – has called on everyone to enable two-factor authentication for their emails. This follows revelations that almost the entire population's details are available for sale on the dark web.…

Machine-learning engine stapled to 3PAR arrays HPE is updating its acquired Nimble Storage InfoSight array management system with a machine learning-driven recommendation engine, and adding InfoSight to 3PAR arrays.…

Black Friday week? Is that a thing? Er, not for all retailers What started as a Saturday afternoon nap for SagePay turned into a three-day snooze fest, angering retailers that were as of last night still struggling to process sales in a peak shopping week.…

Another day, another online banking snafu Users who bank online with the Royal Bank of Scotland are having a tough time logging in this morning.…

User files bug report A Debian software package containing an "ASCII representation of zoophilia" has been installed automatically on some users' machines.…

Burkina Faso the most expensive, UK in top third cheapest Tired of continual price hikes on your broadband deal? Then why not move to Iran? According to a study released today, it has the cheapest broadband in the world (if you're willing to ignore political and social problems...)…

Yeah? Us neither. Here's another 'anchored benchmark' of a storage round-up We start this week's collection of storage news with the marketing buzzwords of the month award, which goes to startup Panoply for outstanding excellence.…

Got a few quid and want to launch a lawsuit? Now is a good time Comment Infamous online cesspit Twitter may have unintentionally made itself easier to sue for the things users write on its site, following recently announced changes to its "blue tick" verification system.…

Storage-class memory Nirvana 1.0 could be a 2019 event, says our man Analysis Storage-class memory (SCM), in the shape of Optane, is already here and, with Samsung's Z-SSD, set to become available for use by servers. What does this mean and when will it actually happen?…

Beyond world domination Part Two In Part One we described how, after 10 years, Android was uncannily similar to Windows after 20 years.…

Company badly forked up after promising secure 'stable digital currency equivalent' Bitcoin outfit “Tether” has reported a US$31m BitBuck BitHeist.…

Out-of-shape ‘Oumuamua only looks like a starship, right? It's official: the Asteroid 1I/2017 U1, aka "‘Oumuamua", which screamed through the solar system in October 2017 is an interstellar object. And a very strange one at that.…

RCE? Check. Clear passwords? Check. Interfere with print jobs? Check Sysadmins have been advised to watch for a coming HP printer firmware update that will plug a remote code execution vulnerability (among others) in its MFP-586 and the M553 printers.…

According to these here estimates, anyway Samsung increased its market share in the NAND supply world in the third quarter of the year, analysts reckon. According to TrendForce's latest estimates, the suppliers' overall flash shipments for Q3 2017 looked like this:…

Carrier tries to speed networking innovation with 'Disaggregated Network Operating System' AT&T has launched an audacious attempt to push the networking industry towards software-defined networking and white-box hardware.…

Six billion bucks does the trick, now let's see what kind of kit they build together The rumours were right: Marvell has formally announced it will buy Cavium, for around six billion US dollars, and plans to emerge as an “Infrastructure Solutions Powerhouse”.…

Boffins beware: random samples are therefore useless for research Given that code sharing is a big part of the GitHub mission, it should come at no surprise that the platform stores a lot of duplicated code: 70 per cent, a study has found.…

The problem's still there in Windows 10, so prepare for code re-use attacks A Carnegie-Mellon CERT researcher has discovered the Microsoft broke some use-cases for its Address Space Layout Randomisation (ASLR), designed to block code-reuse attacks.…

The rest of us just get a 0.04% improvement in EC2 reliability, to a guaranteed 99.99% Amazon Web Services has launched a Secret Region – which we know about because the CIA has endorsed it.…

'We don't care, in fact look at this letter about how little we care. Really. Please look at it' AT&T says it is not worried about the possibility of a US government lawsuit derailing its attempts to acquire Time-Warner.…

Bugs can be exploited to extract info, potentially insert rootkits Intel today admitted its Management Engine (ME), Server Platform Services (SPS), and Trusted Execution Engine (TXE) are vulnerable to multiple worrying security flaws, based on the findings of external security experts.…

Here we go again… Texas Rangers have obtained a search warrant for the contents of a blood-splattered iPhone SE belonging to gunman Devin Kelley who killed 26 people in a murder-suicide at a church.…

Super Cali goes – oh no, wait, this is Colorado Colorado watchdogs today hit Uber subsidiary Rasier with an $8.9m fine for allowing drivers with felony convictions and/or major moving violations to pick up folks using the ride-hailing app.…

Tempest in a teapot scalds FOSS world Special report Two organizations founded to help and support developers of free and open-source software have locked horns in public, betraying a long-running quarrel rumbling mostly behind the scenes.…

Link to fake TSB site canned after we help raise alarm Microsoft has axed a Bing search result advert that masqueraded as a legit online banking website – but was in fact a sophisticated phishing operation.…

Hands up, whose parents are listening in on this class? The German telecoms regulator has banned the sale of children's smartwatches that allow users to secretly listen in on nearby conversations.…

No. 10 promises billions (in a few years), doesn't address Horizon 2020 The government has announced an extra £2.3bn in research and development investment by 2021/22, ahead of the Budget this week.…

Want to consolidate fragmented market Cable giant Liberty Global has inked a deal with MXC Capital, an AIM-listed tech investor, to create a buy-and-build IT services business that sells to UK SMEs.…

DVLA could bring in £15m from fine-wielding corporates The UK government is driving towards a sale of up to 6 million vehicle records to private parking firms, according to a transport lobby group.…