63377553
submission
stephendavion writes:
A legal scholar says he and colleagues have developed an algorithm that can predict, with 70 percent accuracy, whether the US Supreme Court will uphold or reverse the lower-court decision before it. "Using only data available prior to the date of decision, our model correctly identifies 69.7 percent of the Court’s overall affirm and reverse decisions and correctly forecasts 70.9% of the votes of individual justices across 7,700 cases and more than 68,000 justice votes," Josh Blackman, a South Texas College of Law scholar, wrote on his blog Tuesday.
63260819
submission
stephendavion writes:
Three Israeli defense contractors responsible for building the “Iron Dome” missile shield currently protecting Israel from a barrage of rocket attacks were compromised by hackers and robbed of huge quantities of sensitive documents pertaining to the shield technology, KrebsOnSecurity has learned. The never-before publicized intrusions, which occurred between 2011 and 2012, illustrate the continued challenges that defense contractors and other companies face in deterring organized cyber adversaries and preventing the theft of proprietary information.
63056491
submission
stephendavion writes:
Chinese aircraft manufacturer China Aviation Industry General Aircraft (CAIGA) has started trial production of its TA600 amphibious aircraft, claimed to be the world's largest of its kind. With an expected maiden flight late next year, the Chinese plane would replace Japan's ShinMaywa US-2 short takeoff and landing (STOL) aircraft as the largest of its kind globally.
62785059
submission
stephendavion writes:
In just a few short years, in-flight WiFi has gone from a novel idea to an amenity that most passengers just assume is installed when they board. However prevalent passengers may think the technology is, the fact is that a relatively small number of aircraft worldwide offer the service, but a recent survey shows passengers are clamoring for even faster connections. Honeywell Aerospace, a major supplier of in-flight connectivity hardware, conducted a survey between June 6 and June 19, 2014, among 1,045 Americans age 18 and over who have used in-flight Wi-Fi at least once in the last 12 months. The results, while unsurprising as a whole, give some unique insight into the mind of the connected passenger.
62742769
submission
stephendavion writes:
A team of US Navy scientists recently announced they had converted seawater into fuel. The technology is described as a ‘game changer’ which could drastically reduce the US military’s dependency on fossil fuels. Could the technology solve the current fuel dilemma in commercial shipping as well? In April, scientists from the US Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) announced they had successfully powered a remote-controlled aircraft using nothing but seawater. By extracting carbon dioxide (CO2) and hydrogen and converting it to a liquid hydrocarbon fuel, researchers at the NRL's Materials Science and Technology Division had proved that seawater fuel was actually possible.
62478029
submission
stephendavion writes:
Google has launched a version of its Analytics app for iOS. The app which is available globally and optimized for iPhone and iPod touch lets you access all of your Web and app data as usual, but now it’s packaged in a mobile-friendly format for Apple devices. You can peruse page-view figures and real-time reports of traffic by region, source and more.
62418681
submission
stephendavion writes:
London Gatwick Airport is one of the aviation industry's early adopters of wide-ranging cloud services for its core IT needs. Leading the charge is Gatwick's CIO Michael Ibbitson, who has been pushing to reduce the airport's reliance on centralised data centres by outsourcing to the cloud. In an exclusive interview, Ibbitson gets into the nitty-gritty of revolutionising the IT infrastructure at one of the UK's main air hubs.
62348557
submission
stephendavion writes:
Despite being touted as the best way to clean up dirty fossil fuels, commercial deployment of carbon capture storage (CCS) in the power industry has been near non-existent. Now, for the first time ever, a coal-fired power plant is being retrofitted with CCS. The plant, located in Canada, is near completion, while a similar project in the US is also under construction. For continued growth, the coal industry must get clean. Carbon capture storage (CCS) technology is ready and available but is still relatively expensive and has, until recently, never been applied to the power industry before. Two power companies — one in Canada and another in the US — have set out to show how the economics and technology of CCS can be applied to the power industry.
62343555
submission
stephendavion writes:
The luxe electric car company Tesla Motors is not very happy with the Obama administration. Last Friday evening, the White House rejected a petition asking it to "allow Tesla Motors to sell directly to consumers in all 50 states." The company responded with a statement of its own criticizing the White House's response as "disappointing" and "timid."
Tesla has been battling multiple local governments over its direct sales model. The position calling on the White House to support the company was posted June 5, 2013 and earned the 100,000 signatures necessary for a White House response within its first month.
The White House response, which was written by Dan Utech, a special assistant to the president for energy and climate change, said, "as you know, laws regulating auto sales are issues that have traditionally sat with lawmakers at the state level." Utech went on to cite several initiatives the administration had launched "in promoting vehicle efficiency."
62289495
submission
stephendavion writes:
MIT researchers develop an improved system for timing of urban lights to minimize commuting times. Anyone who has ever driven a city street and been frustrated by having to stop again and again for red lights has probably thought that there must be a better way. Now, researchers at MIT have developed a means of computing optimal timings for city stoplights that can significantly reduce drivers’ average travel times.
Existing software for timing traffic signals has several limitations, says Carolina Osorio, an assistant professor of civil and environmental engineering at MIT. She is lead author of a forthcoming paper in the journal Transportation Science that describes the new system, based on a study of traffic in Lausanne, Switzerland.
62289459
submission
stephendavion writes:
Continuing the trend toward nearly everything becoming smartphone-friendly — from ovens to boxing gloves — benches in the Boston area are getting a technology boost, too. Some park dwellers in the region are already charging their mobile devices via solar-powered benches, which could eventually collect real-time data about its surrounding environment too (think air quality and noise levels).
Smart urban furniture company Soofa (developed by Changing Environments, an MIT Media Lab spin-off) is bringing more of its solar-powered benches to Boston and Cambridge, Mass. parks soon. The name Soofa stems from an acronym the company developed to describe a smart urban furniture appliance: SUFA. To give it more of a Silicon Valley feel, Richter switched the letter u to double o's.
62164759
submission
stephendavion writes:
William Binney is one of the highest-level whistleblowers to ever emerge from the NSA. He was a leading code-breaker against the Soviet Union during the Cold War but resigned soon after September 11, disgusted by Washington’s move towards mass surveillance.
On 5 July he spoke at a conference in London organised by the Centre for Investigative Journalism and revealed the extent of the surveillance programs unleashed by the Bush and Obama administrations.
“At least 80% of fibre-optic cables globally go via the US”, Binney said. “This is no accident and allows the US to view all communication coming in. At least 80% of all audio calls, not just metadata, are recorded and stored in the US. The NSA lies about what it stores.”
62120345
submission
stephendavion writes:
Scientists and engineers at BAE Systems have lifted the lid on some futuristic technologies that could be incorporated in military and civil aircraft of 2040 or even earlier.
The four technologies unveiled are: 3D printers so advanced they could print UAVs during a mission; aircraft parts that can heal themselves in minutes; a new type of long range aircraft which divides into a number of smaller aircraft when it reaches its destination, and a directed energy weapon that could engage missiles at the speed of light, destroy them and protect the people below.
62053943
submission
stephendavion writes:
A computer science student accused of hacking offences has been jailed for six months for failing to hand over his encryption passwords, which he had been urged to do in "the interests of national security".
Christopher Wilson, 22, of Mitford Close, Washington, Tyne and Wear, was jailed for refusing to hand over his computer passwords, a move that frustrated an investigation into claims he launched an attack on a police website.
Wilson, who has Asperger's Syndrome, was suspected of "trolling" the Northumbria Police as well as attempting to break into the Serious Organised Crime Agency's website.
62007245
submission
stephendavion writes:
Samsung Electronics, Intel Corp and Dell have joined to establish standard ways for household gadgets like thermostats and light bulbs to talk to each other, at odds with a framework backed by Qualcomm, LG Electronics and other companies.
The new Open Interconnect Consortium, like the Qualcomm-supported AllSeen Alliance, aims to establish how smart devices work together in a trend increasingly called the Internet of Things.
Manufacturers are rolling out growing numbers of Internet-connected burglar alarms, televisions and light switches. But like the early days of video cassette recorders, current smart home products are often incompatible with each other. The new consortium, which also includes chipmakers Broadcom and Atmel, was announced in a news release late on Monday.
