Comment a step further (Score 4, Informative) 26
https://downloads.aaronia.com/datasheets/solutions/drone_detection/Aaronia_AARTOS_DDS_FAQ.pdf
New Toyotas Will Upload Data To AWS To Help Create Custom Insurance Premiums Based On Driver Behavior (theregister.com) 206
KindMind shares a report from The Register: Toyota has expanded its collaboration with Amazon Web Services in ways that will see many of its models upload performance data into the Amazonian cloud to expand the services the auto-maker offers to drivers and fleet owners. [...] Toyota reckons the data could turn into "new contextual services such as car share, rideshare, full-service lease, and new corporate and consumer services such as proactive vehicle maintenance notifications and driving behavior-based insurance."
The two companies say their joint efforts "will help build a foundation for streamlined and secure data sharing throughout the company and accelerate its move toward CASE (Connected, Autonomous/Automated, Shared and Electric) mobility technologies." Neither party has specified just which bits of the AWS cloud Toyota will take for a spin but it seems sensible to suggest the auto-maker is going to need lots of storage and analytics capabilities, making AWS S3 and Kinesis likely candidates for a test drive. Whatever Toyota uses, prepare for privacy ponderings because while cheaper car insurance sounds lovely, having an insurer source driving data from a manufacturer has plenty of potential pitfalls.
The two companies say their joint efforts "will help build a foundation for streamlined and secure data sharing throughout the company and accelerate its move toward CASE (Connected, Autonomous/Automated, Shared and Electric) mobility technologies." Neither party has specified just which bits of the AWS cloud Toyota will take for a spin but it seems sensible to suggest the auto-maker is going to need lots of storage and analytics capabilities, making AWS S3 and Kinesis likely candidates for a test drive. Whatever Toyota uses, prepare for privacy ponderings because while cheaper car insurance sounds lovely, having an insurer source driving data from a manufacturer has plenty of potential pitfalls.
Facebook Algorithm Found To 'Actively Promote' Holocaust Denial (theguardian.com) 176
AmiMoJo writes: Facebook's algorithm "actively promotes" Holocaust denial content according to an analysis that will increase pressure on the social media giant to remove antisemitic content relating to the Nazi genocide. An investigation by the Institute for Strategic Dialogue (ISD), a UK-based counter-extremist organisation, found that typing "holocaust" in the Facebook search function brought up suggestions for denial pages, which in turn recommended links to publishers which sell revisionist and denial literature, as well as pages dedicated to the notorious British Holocaust denier David Irving. The findings coincide with mounting international demands from Holocaust survivors to Facebook's boss, Mark Zuckerberg, to remove such material from the site. Last Wednesday Facebook announced it was banning conspiracy theories about Jewish people "controlling the world." However, it has been unwilling to categorise Holocaust denial as a form of hate speech, a stance that ISD describe as a "conceptual blind spot." The ISD also discovered at least 36 Facebook groups with a combined 366,068 followers which are specifically dedicated to Holocaust denial or which host such content. Researchers found that when they followed public Facebook pages containing Holocaust denial content, Facebook recommended further similar content.
Apple 'Suddenly Catches TikTok Secretly Spying On Millions Of iPhone Users', Claims Forbes (forbes.com) 61
In February, Reddit's CEO called TikTok "fundamentally parasitic," according to a report on TechCrunch, adding "it's always listening, the fingerprinting technology they use is truly terrifying, and I could not bring myself to install an app like that on my phone... I actively tell people, 'Don't install that spyware on your phone.'"
TikTok called his remarks "baseless accusations made without a shred of evidence."
But now Apple "has fixed a serious problem in iOS 14, due in the fall, where apps can secretly access the clipboard on users' devices..." reports Forbes cybersecurity contributor Zak Doffman, noting that one of the biggest offenders it revealed still turns out to be TikTok: Worryingly, one of the apps caught snooping [in March] by security researchers Talal Haj Bakry and Tommy Mysk was China's TikTok. Given other security concerns raised about the app, as well as broader worries given its Chinese origins, this became a headline issue. At the time, TikTok owner Bytedance told me the problem related to the use of an outdated Google advertising SDK that was being replaced.
Well, maybe not. With the release of the new clipboard warning in the beta version of iOS 14, now with developers, TikTok seems to have been caught abusing the clipboard in a quite extraordinary way. So it seems that TikTok didn't stop this invasive practice back in April as promised after all. Worse, the excuse has now changed. According to TikTok, the issue is now "triggered by a feature designed to identify repetitive, spammy behavior," and has told me that it has "already submitted an updated version of the app to the App Store removing the anti-spam feature to eliminate any potential confusion." In other words: We've been caught doing something we shouldn't, we've rushed out a fix...
iOS users can relax, knowing that Apple's latest safeguard will force TikTok to make the change, which in itself shows how critical a fix this has been. For Android users, though, there is no word yet as to whether this is an issue for them as well.
Long-time Slashdot reader schwit1 also shares an online rumor from an anonymous Redditor (with a 7-year-old account) who claims to be a software engineer who's reverse engineered TikTok's software and learned more scary things, concluding that TikTok is a "data collection service that is thinly-veiled as a social network."
So far the most reputable news outlets that have repeated his allegations are Bored Panda, Stuff, Hot Hardware, and Illinois radio station WBNQ.
TikTok called his remarks "baseless accusations made without a shred of evidence."
But now Apple "has fixed a serious problem in iOS 14, due in the fall, where apps can secretly access the clipboard on users' devices..." reports Forbes cybersecurity contributor Zak Doffman, noting that one of the biggest offenders it revealed still turns out to be TikTok: Worryingly, one of the apps caught snooping [in March] by security researchers Talal Haj Bakry and Tommy Mysk was China's TikTok. Given other security concerns raised about the app, as well as broader worries given its Chinese origins, this became a headline issue. At the time, TikTok owner Bytedance told me the problem related to the use of an outdated Google advertising SDK that was being replaced.
Well, maybe not. With the release of the new clipboard warning in the beta version of iOS 14, now with developers, TikTok seems to have been caught abusing the clipboard in a quite extraordinary way. So it seems that TikTok didn't stop this invasive practice back in April as promised after all. Worse, the excuse has now changed. According to TikTok, the issue is now "triggered by a feature designed to identify repetitive, spammy behavior," and has told me that it has "already submitted an updated version of the app to the App Store removing the anti-spam feature to eliminate any potential confusion." In other words: We've been caught doing something we shouldn't, we've rushed out a fix...
iOS users can relax, knowing that Apple's latest safeguard will force TikTok to make the change, which in itself shows how critical a fix this has been. For Android users, though, there is no word yet as to whether this is an issue for them as well.
Long-time Slashdot reader schwit1 also shares an online rumor from an anonymous Redditor (with a 7-year-old account) who claims to be a software engineer who's reverse engineered TikTok's software and learned more scary things, concluding that TikTok is a "data collection service that is thinly-veiled as a social network."
So far the most reputable news outlets that have repeated his allegations are Bored Panda, Stuff, Hot Hardware, and Illinois radio station WBNQ.
Hackers Breach LineageOS Servers Via Unpatched Vulnerability (zdnet.com) 9
An anonymous reader writes: Hackers have gained access to the core infrastructure of LineageOS, a mobile operating system based on Android, used for smartphones, tablets, and set-top boxes. The intrusion took place on Saturday night at around 8 pm (US Pacific coast), and was detected before the attackers could do any harm, the LineageOS team said in a statement published less than three hours after the incident. The LineageOS team said the operating system's source code was unaffected, and so were any operating system builds, which had been already paused since April 30, because of an unrelated issue. Signing keys, used to authenticate official OS distributions, were also unaffected, as these hosts were stored separately from the LineageOS main infrastructure. LineageOS developers said the hack took place after the attacker used an unpatched vulnerability to breach its Salt installation.
Comment Re:No Autonomy (Score 2) 125
You might have missed that Musk made the same claim about 2016, with the 1-camera sensor system. The 2017 claim was with the newer 8-camera system, and the claim was made before Tesla even had software for the new sensors, and the Tesla then lacked adaptive cruise control, adaptive high beam, self parking, summon, and other things that the prior model did have. I'm embarrassed that I actually believed these claims.
Not a Fermion, Not a Boson. Scientists Find New Evidence of Two-Dimensional 'Anyons' (sciencenews.org) 51
Slashdot reader Nostalgia4Infinity shared this report from Science News:
In the three-dimensional world we live in, there are two classes of elementary particles: bosons and fermions. But in two dimensions, theoretical physicists predict, there's another option: anyons. Now, scientists report new evidence that anyons exist and that they behave unlike any known particle. Using a tiny "collider," researchers flung presumed anyons at one another to help confirm their identities, physicists report in the April 10 Science...
Braiding some types of anyons may be a useful technique for building better quantum computers. Current versions of those computers are highly susceptible to mistakes slipping into calculations. Like a neat plait that keeps unruly hair in line, braided anyons could store information in a manner that is resistant to such errors.
Although the new study hasn't demonstrated braiding, it gets scientists a step closer to understanding anyons. "It's a beautiful experiment. It is definitely going beyond what was done in the past," Nayak says.
Braiding some types of anyons may be a useful technique for building better quantum computers. Current versions of those computers are highly susceptible to mistakes slipping into calculations. Like a neat plait that keeps unruly hair in line, braided anyons could store information in a manner that is resistant to such errors.
Although the new study hasn't demonstrated braiding, it gets scientists a step closer to understanding anyons. "It's a beautiful experiment. It is definitely going beyond what was done in the past," Nayak says.
Syd Mead, Visionary 'Blade Runner' Artist and Futurist, Dies at 86 (variety.com) 28
sandbagger writes: Visual artist and futurist Syd Mead, who helped shape the look of influential sci-fi films including "Blade Runner," "Tron," "Aliens" and "Star Trek: The Motion Picture," died Monday of complications from lymphoma in Pasadena, Calif. He was 86. Mead was set to receive the Art Directors Guild's William Cameron Menzies Award during the Guild's 24th Annual awards in February for his contributions on "Aliens," "Blade Runner" and "Star Trek: The Motion Picture."
How Tech From Australia Could Prevent California Wildfires and PG&E Blackouts (ieee.org) 106
"Technology developed to combat Australia's deadly bushfires could slash California's fire risk and reduce the need for PG&E's 'public safety power shutoffs'," reports IEEE Spectrum.
"See the video to watch an advanced power diverter cut off 22,000 volts of power in less than 1/20th of a second, preventing ignition of dry brush," writes Slashdot reader carbonnation.
IEEE Spectrum reports: California utility Pacific Gas & Electric (PG&E) delivered a bitter pill last month when it said that deliberate blackouts to keep its lines from sparking wildfires could be the new normal for millions of customers for the next decade -- a dangerous disruption to power-dependent communities that California governor Gavin Newsom says "no state in the 21st Century should experience."
Grid experts say Newsom is right, because technology available today can slash the risk of grid-induced fires, reducing or eliminating the need for PG&E's "public safety power shutoffs...."
Some of the most innovative fire-beating grid technologies are the products of an R&D program funded by the state of Victoria in Australia, prompted by deadly grid-sparked bushfires there 10 years ago. Early this year, utilities in Victoria began a massive rollout of one solution: power diverters that are expected to protect all of the substations serving the state's high fire risk areas by 2024. "It's not cheap to put one in but once you do it, you've got 1,000 kilometers of network that's suddenly a lot safer," says Monash University professor Tony Marxsen, former chair of the Australian Energy Market Operator, Australia's power grid regulator, and chairman of Melbourne-based grid equipment developer IND Technology.
The power diverters -- known as Rapid Earth Fault Current Limiters (REFCLs) -- react to the surge of current unleashed when a power line strikes the ground or is struck by a tree. When this happens on one of Victoria's 22-kilovolt distribution circuits, the REFCL instantly begins collapsing the faulted line's voltage toward 100 volts, and can get there in as few as 40 milliseconds (ms). "If it can do it within 85 ms, you won't get fires," he says... Marxsen says 20 to 30 percent of the distribution circuits in PG&E's territory have the appropriate three-phase design for REFCLs, as do a similar proportion of circuits in the territory of Southern California Edison (which is also grappling with grid-sparked wildfires). "It would certainly offer the option of not shutting down the networks when there's high fire risk," he says.
"See the video to watch an advanced power diverter cut off 22,000 volts of power in less than 1/20th of a second, preventing ignition of dry brush," writes Slashdot reader carbonnation.
IEEE Spectrum reports: California utility Pacific Gas & Electric (PG&E) delivered a bitter pill last month when it said that deliberate blackouts to keep its lines from sparking wildfires could be the new normal for millions of customers for the next decade -- a dangerous disruption to power-dependent communities that California governor Gavin Newsom says "no state in the 21st Century should experience."
Grid experts say Newsom is right, because technology available today can slash the risk of grid-induced fires, reducing or eliminating the need for PG&E's "public safety power shutoffs...."
Some of the most innovative fire-beating grid technologies are the products of an R&D program funded by the state of Victoria in Australia, prompted by deadly grid-sparked bushfires there 10 years ago. Early this year, utilities in Victoria began a massive rollout of one solution: power diverters that are expected to protect all of the substations serving the state's high fire risk areas by 2024. "It's not cheap to put one in but once you do it, you've got 1,000 kilometers of network that's suddenly a lot safer," says Monash University professor Tony Marxsen, former chair of the Australian Energy Market Operator, Australia's power grid regulator, and chairman of Melbourne-based grid equipment developer IND Technology.
The power diverters -- known as Rapid Earth Fault Current Limiters (REFCLs) -- react to the surge of current unleashed when a power line strikes the ground or is struck by a tree. When this happens on one of Victoria's 22-kilovolt distribution circuits, the REFCL instantly begins collapsing the faulted line's voltage toward 100 volts, and can get there in as few as 40 milliseconds (ms). "If it can do it within 85 ms, you won't get fires," he says... Marxsen says 20 to 30 percent of the distribution circuits in PG&E's territory have the appropriate three-phase design for REFCLs, as do a similar proportion of circuits in the territory of Southern California Edison (which is also grappling with grid-sparked wildfires). "It would certainly offer the option of not shutting down the networks when there's high fire risk," he says.
Comment Wx Bindings for Perl6 (Score 1) 100
If Wx isn't that large, I might take a stab at porting it... who knows.
Comment Re:Does it matter? (Score 1) 100
You will have to tell me how:
^10000.grep( *.is-prime).say; # Retrieve prime numbers from 0-10,000
Is incomprehsible bullshit and:
given $value {
when Str {
when Int {
when Bool {
default {
}
Is mind wanking....
If you've really tried the language, why not give it a comprehensive review?
Comment Re:Appeal to Authority (Score 3, Informative) 119
I am careful in all such interviews to say that Facebook is fine for anyone who likes it, for whom the plusses outweigh any minuses. I state that it's just wrong for me, myself, or others like myself. How can I not be "right" about that?
Comment Die in your sleep... (Score 1) 213
At least Tesla respects our right to die in our sleep.
Under Current Policies, Residential Batteries Increase Emissions In Most Cases (arstechnica.com) 182
schwit1 shares a report: Another year, another reason to take the promises of residential home batteries with a grain of salt. This month, a group of researchers from the University of California San Diego (UCSD) published a paper in Environmental Science and Technology reporting that there are very few cases in which operating a residential home battery reduces overall emissions -- assuming that households are economically rational and trying to minimize costs.
Of course, if the battery is only discharged during periods of peak emissions and only charged when fossil fuel use is low, then a household might reduce emissions. But across 16 representative regions, operating a battery this way ended up being costly. "There may be good reasons to decentralize the grid through ubiquitous installation of small RES [Residential Energy Storage], but cost-effective emissions control is not one of them at the moment," the researchers write.
Of course, if the battery is only discharged during periods of peak emissions and only charged when fossil fuel use is low, then a household might reduce emissions. But across 16 representative regions, operating a battery this way ended up being costly. "There may be good reasons to decentralize the grid through ubiquitous installation of small RES [Residential Energy Storage], but cost-effective emissions control is not one of them at the moment," the researchers write.
Google Erases Kurdistan From Maps in Compliance With Turkish Government (kurdistan24.net) 203
schwit1 shares a report: Google has removed a map outlining the geographical extent of the Greater Kurdistan after the Turkish state asked it to do so, a simple inquiry on the Internet giant's search engine from Wednesday on can show. "Unavailable. This map is no longer available due to a violation of our Terms of Service and/or policies," a note on the page that the map was previously on read. Google did not provide further details on how the Kurdistan map violated its rules.
The map in question, available for years, used to be on Google's My Maps service, a feature of Google Maps that enables users to create custom maps for personal use or sharing through search. Maps drawn by ancient Greeks, Islamic historians, Ottomans, and Westerners showing Kurdistan with alternative names such as "Corduene" or "Karduchi" have existed since antiquity. The use of the name "Kurdistan" was banned by the administration of Turkey's founder Mustafa Kemal Ataturk in the immediate aftermath of the crushed Sheikh Said uprising for Kurdish statehood in 1925. Further reading: Local media report. "Turkish officials outraged by Google map showing the unofficial border of Kurdistan. Turkey demands the removal of the map. There are around 40 million Kurds divided between 4 main countries," Jiyar Gol, a BBC correspondent tweeted.
The map in question, available for years, used to be on Google's My Maps service, a feature of Google Maps that enables users to create custom maps for personal use or sharing through search. Maps drawn by ancient Greeks, Islamic historians, Ottomans, and Westerners showing Kurdistan with alternative names such as "Corduene" or "Karduchi" have existed since antiquity. The use of the name "Kurdistan" was banned by the administration of Turkey's founder Mustafa Kemal Ataturk in the immediate aftermath of the crushed Sheikh Said uprising for Kurdish statehood in 1925. Further reading: Local media report. "Turkish officials outraged by Google map showing the unofficial border of Kurdistan. Turkey demands the removal of the map. There are around 40 million Kurds divided between 4 main countries," Jiyar Gol, a BBC correspondent tweeted.
