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Submission + - Stephen Hawking claims "there are no black holes" (nature.com)

Submitted by ananyo
ananyo writes: Stephen Hawking has proposed a new solution to the black-hole firewall paradox, which has been vexing physicists for almost two years, after its discovery by theoretical physicists Joe Polchinski at the Kavli Institute for Theoretical Physics in Santa Barbara, California, and colleagues. The paradox troubles physicists because if the firewall scenario is correct, Einstein’s general theory of relativity is flouted. But the classical theory black hole cannot be reconciled to the quantum mechanical prediction that energy and information can escape from a black hole.
Now Hawking has proposed a tantalizingly simple solution to the paradox which allows both quantum mechanics and general relativity to remain intact--black holes simply do not have an event horizon to catch fire. The key to his claim is that quantum effects around the black hole cause spacetime to fluctuate too wildly for a sharp boundary surface to exist. As Hawking writes in his paper, "The absence of event horizons mean that there are no black holes — in the sense of regimes from which light can't escape to infinity."

Submission + - Netflix Threatens To Rally User Base To Rise Up And Save Net Neutrality (hothardware.com)

Submitted by MojoKid
MojoKid writes: Over the past few weeks, net neutrality has seen serious challenges from the likes of Verizon and AT&T. Verizon won a court case in which the FCC's rules on net neutrality were effectively gutted, while AT&T introduced a new pricing plan for content providers called Sponsored Data, which pushes companies like Netflix to pay an additional per-user fee to have video streams not count against that users' bandwidth. Everyone has been curious about how Netflix might respond to this, and now the company's CEO has tendered his answer in a letter to shareholders. Reed Hastings has challenged the decision to strike down net neutrality in strong terms, writing: "In principle, a domestic ISP now can legally impede the video streams that members request from Netflix, degrading the experience we jointly provide. The motivation could be to get Netflix to pay fees to stop this degradation. Were this draconian scenario to unfold with some ISPs, we would vigorously protest and encourage our members to demand the open Internet they are paying their ISP to deliver."

Submission + - Facebook mocks 'infection' study, predicts Princeton's demise (facebook.com) 1

Submitted by Okian Warrior
Okian Warrior writes: In a followup to our earlier story about Princeton researchers predicting the end of Facebook by 2017, Facebook has struck back with a post using similar statistical techniques to predict that Princeton itself may be facing irreversible decline.

By using similar methods ("likes," mentions in scholarly papers, Google searches) Facebook creates convincing-looking graphs that indicate Princeton is losing ground compared with its rivals and may have no students at all by 2021.

Submission + - Court Says Craigslist Sperm Donor Must Pay Child Support

Submitted by Hugh Pickens DOT Com
Hugh Pickens DOT Com writes: David Stout reports at Time Magazine that what began with a Craigslist ad from a lesbian couple calling for a sperm donor in rural Topeka, Kansas ended in court on Wednesday with a judge ordering the sperm donor to pay child support. The Kansas Department for Children and Families filed the case in October 2012 seeking to have William Marotta declared the father of a child born to Jennifer Schreiner in 2009 so he can be held responsible for about $6,000 in public assistance the state provided, as well as future child support. "In this case, quite simply, the parties failed to perform to statutory requirement of the Kansas Parentage Act in not enlisting a licensed physician at some point in the artificial insemination process, and the parties' self-designation of (Marotta) as a sperm donor is insufficient to relieve (Marotta) of parental right and responsibilities to the child," wrote Judge Mattivi. Marotta opposed that action, saying he had contacted Schreiner and her partner at the time, Angela Bauer, in response to an ad they placed on Craigslist seeking a sperm donor and signed a contract waiving his parental rights and responsibilities. "We stand by that contract," says Defense attorney Swinnen adding that the Kansas statute doesn't specifically require the artificial insemination be carried out by a physician. "The insinuation is offensive, and we are responding vigorously to that. We stand by our story. There was no personal relationship whatsoever between my client and the mother, or the partner of the mother, or the child. Anything the state insinuates is vilifying my client, and I will address it."

Submission + - Yep, People Are Still Using '123456' and 'Password' as Passwords in 2014 (slashdot.org)

Submitted by Nerval's Lobster
Nerval's Lobster writes: Earlier this week, SplashData released its annual list of the 25 most common passwords used on the Internet—and no surprise, most are so blindingly obvious it’s a shock that people still rely on them to protect their data: '12345,' 'password,' 'qwerty' '11111,' and worse. There were some interesting quirks in the dataset, however. Following a massive security breach in late 2013, a large amount of Adobe users’ passwords leaked onto the broader Web; many of those users based their password on either ‘Adobe’ or ‘Photoshop,’ which are terms (along with the ever-popular ‘password’) easily discoverable using today’s hacker tools. “Seeing passwords like ‘adobe123 and ‘photoshop’ on this list offers a good reminder not to base your password on the name of the website or application you are accessing,” Morgan Slain, CEO of SplashData, wrote in a statement. Slashdotters have known for years that, while it's always tempting to create a password that’s easy to remember—especially if you maintain profiles on multiple online services—the consequences of an attacker breaking into your accounts are potentially devastating. As you know, complex passwords with a mix of numbers, letters and special characters (#,$,%,&, etc.) are best; avoid passwords based on dictionary words, numerical sequences (“1234567”), or personal information (such as your birthday).

Comment Until it is safe (Score 1) 1

by ripvlan (#45969453) Attached to: Google Glass To Be Banned While Driving In NY?

Just because something is created doesn't mean it is suitable or safe to use in all situations. People still believe that hands-free solves all problems when it has been proven multiple times that distraction is distraction (although it may be a matter of degree).

I read a review by one Google Glass user who basically said, "yeah - I'd never drive with this again. Sounded like a good idea - tried it once, bad idea"

The developers of technology need to think about safety (and risk) and build appropriate features. Until then, things that seem dangerous are just going to be blocked. Granted - sometimes new technology scares some. Still - safety is a reasonable concern.

Submission + - TrueCrypt Master Key Extraction And Volume Identification (blogspot.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: The Volatility memory forensics project has developed plugins that can automatically find instances of Truecrypt within RAM dumps and extract the associated keys and parameters. Previous research in this area has focused specifically on AES keys and led to the development of tools such as aeskeyfind. The Volatility plugin takes a different approach by finding and analyzing the same data structures in memory that Truecrypt uses to manage encryption and decryption of data that is being read from and written to disk. With the creation of these plugins a wide range of investigators can now decrypt Truecrypt volumes regardless of the algorithm used (AES, Seperent, combinations of algos, etc.). Users of Truecrypt should be extra careful of physical security of their systems to prevent investigators from gaining access to the contents of physical memory.

Submission + - Why Standard Deviation Should Be Retired From Scientific Use (edge.org) 1

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Statistician and author Nassim Taleb has a suggestion for scientific researchers: stop trying to use standard deviations in your work. He says it's misunderstood more often than not and also not the best tool for its purpose. 'It is all due to a historical accident: in 1893, the great Karl Pearson introduced the term "standard deviation" for what had been known as "root mean square error." The confusion started then: people thought it meant mean deviation. The idea stuck: every time a newspaper has attempted to clarify the concept of market "volatility", it defined it verbally as mean deviation yet produced the numerical measure of the (higher) standard deviation. But it is not just journalists who fall for the mistake: I recall seeing official documents from the department of commerce and the Federal Reserve partaking of the conflation, even regulators in statements on market volatility. What is worse, Goldstein and I found that a high number of data scientists (many with PhDs) also get confused in real life.'

Submission + - Google Glass To Be Banned While Driving In NY? 1

Submitted by cartechboy
cartechboy writes: Distracted driving is a hot topic. It feels like just yesterday people were talking about the upcoming handsfree laws that were about to go into effect. "OMG! We can't talk on the phone without Bluetooth while driving! What will we do?" Fast forward to the year 2014 (how'd that happen so fast?) and we have the Government talking about wearable tech while behind the wheel. Now Brooklyn Assemblyman Felix Ortiz is proposing a ban on Google Glass for drivers in New York state, as he says the device is "extremely dangerous technology." He isn't alone. West Virginia and Wyoming are also trying to prevent drivers from using Google Glass while behind the wheel, and a woman in California received a traffic ticket for wearing it while driving. The problem is: wearable tech is the future of gadgets. So is banning it while behind the wheel the right solution, or should elected officials spend time working with companies to figure out how to incorporate this piece of the future into driving?

Comment What can go wrong? (Score 1) 567

Sure - what can go wrong by allowing a device to track your every move?

Yes - some cars have black boxes in them. But I don't believe those are consulted until after the, eh, crime.

Although - I suppose my cell phone is already tracking my every move - in far more detail than my car ever would. Google certainly knows where I've been and even guesses where I want to go next. Friday at 5pm it pops up, "20 minute drive to [girlfriend] house with traffic"

I downloaded my insurance company's app and then took my car to a race track just to screw with their data.

Next stop, Orwellville.

Submission + - Japanese researchers build rock-paper-scissors robot that wins 100% of the time (u-tokyo.ac.jp)

Submitted by slew
slew writes: Although the robot technically it cheats because it watches your hand and can recognize what shape you are intending to make and beat it before you even know what is happening. Apparently it takes about 60ms for you to shape your hand, but the robot can recognize the shape before it is completed, and only takes 20ms to counter your shape so the results appear to the human opponent to be virtually simultaneous.

I wonder how difficult it would be to add lizard and spock to the mix.... ;^)

Here is a paper with the details and a press account or two. There are videos in the links in case you want to see it in action.

Submission + - Microsoft Expands Bug Bounty to Attacks Bypassing Windows Mitigations (threatpost.com)

Submitted by msm1267
msm1267 writes: Having found some initial success with its first foray into the bug bounty world, Microsoft is expanding the program to open up payments of up to $100,000 to incident response teams and forensics experts who come across active attacks in the wild that include new techniques that bypass exploit mitigations in place on the newest version of Windows.

The change is designed to broaden the field of people who can submit new attack techniques to Microsoft, therefore helping the company further secure Windows. The Microsoft bug bounty program is different from most vendors’ programs, as it pays out not for individual vulnerabilities but rather for new attack and defensive techniques.

Submission + - Withhold Passwords From Your Employer, Go to Jail? (forbes.com)

Submitted by ericgoldman
ericgoldman writes: Terry Childs was a network engineer in San Francisco, and he was the only employee with passwords to the network. After he was fired, he withheld the passwords from his former employer, preventing his employer from controlling its own network. Recently, a California appeals court upheld his conviction for violating California's computer crime law, including a 4 year jail sentence and $1.5 million of restitution. The ruling provides a good cautionary tale for anyone who thinks they can gain leverage over their employer or increase job security by controlling key passwords.

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