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Medicine

Researchers: Rats Didn't Spread Black Death, Humans Did 135

Posted by samzenpus from the won't-somebody-please-think-of-the-rats? dept.
concertina226 (2447056) writes "Scientists studying the human remains of plague victims found during excavations for London's new Crossrail train line have concluded that humans spread the Black Death rather than rats, a fact that could rewrite history books. University of Keele scientists, working together with Crossrail's lead archaeologist Jay Carver and osteologists from the Museum of London, analyzed the bones and teeth of 25 skeletons dug up by Crossrail. They found DNA of Yersinia pestis, which is responsible for the Black Death, on the teeth of some of the victims."

Comment Why SHOULDN'T gays be allowed to marry? (Score 1) 824

by EmagGeek (#46597943) Attached to: Some Mozilla Employees Demand New CEO Step Down

Marriage has absolutely dick to do with religion anymore. Marriage is a state-run institution that affords married couples certain rights and privileges that ensure the steadfastness of their union and protects it from state interference. That is all.

Perhaps the most important part of marriage is that married couples enjoy the right of spousal privilege in legal proceedings. One spouse may not be compelled by the State to testify against the other, nor reveal the contents of privileged communications, for example. That's huge, and it is something that gay couples in states that do not recognize or allow gay marriages do not have. Any two people who are committed to each other should have this right of privilege.

What States really ought to do is just remove the word "Marriage" from all of their books and only offer civil unions, to any couple who desires to have one. If you want to have a religious marriage, get one in a Church, and follow your religion's rules, but leave the rest of us out of it. Religious folk do not have the right to force the rest of us to follow their religion, and in fact our Constitution guarantees that gay couples are free from state-sanctioned discriminatory religious beliefs.
NASA

NASA Puts Its New Spacesuit Design To a Public Vote 127

Posted by Soulskill from the i-don't-see-the-starfleet-logo-anywhere dept.
An anonymous reader writes "NASA, in collaboration with ILC and Philadelphia University, has designed three different cover layers for its new spacesuit prototype, Z-2. NASA will let the public decide which of the three designs will actually be built. Voting is open through April 15, 2014, at 11:59 p.m. EDT. Here are brief descriptions of the three designs: 'The "Biomimicry" design draws from an environment with many parallels to the harshness of space: the world's oceans. Mirroring the bioluminescent qualities of aquatic creatures found at incredible depths, and the scaly skin of fish and reptiles found across the globe, this design reflects the qualities that protect some of Earth's toughest creatures. ... "Technology" pays homage to spacesuit achievements of the past while incorporating subtle elements of the future. By using Luminex wire and light-emitting patches, this design puts a new spin on spacewalking standards such as ways to identify crew members. ... "Trends in Society" is based off of just that: being reflective of what every day clothes may look like in the not too distant future. This suit uses electroluminescent wire and a bright color scheme to mimic the appearance of sportswear and the emerging world of wearable technologies.'"
Security

Remote ATM Attack Uses SMS To Dispense Cash 150

Posted by timothy from the $$$-rofl-omg-$$$ dept.
judgecorp (778838) writes "A newly discovered malware attack uses a smartphone connected to the computer that manages an ATM, and then sends an SMS message to instruct it to dispense cash. The attack was reported by Symantec, and builds on a previous piece of malware called Backdoor.Ploutus. It is being used in actual attacks, and Symantec has demonstrated it with an ATM in its labs, though it is not revealing the brand of the vulnerable machines."
The Almighty Buck

Big Data Breaches Give Credit Monitoring Services a Boost 48

Posted by timothy from the glaziers-love-broken-windows dept.
Hugh Pickens DOT Com (2995471) writes "As attacks like the one on Target have exposed up to 40 million customer payment card accounts and the names, addresses and email addresses of as many as 70 million shoppers, Tiffany Hsu and E. Scott Reckard report in the LA Times that increased activity by data hackers has produced millions of victims but there has been one big winner: credit monitoring businesses. "It's almost a terrible thing to say, but these kinds of situations raise awareness of the need to protect yourself and to be more vigilant in checking your transactions," says Yaron Samid. Meanwhile services with names such as BillGuard and Identity Guard report a surge in sign-ups from people anxious to be protected. For example, the number of AAA Southern California members opting in for the club's identity theft monitoring service — whether for free or for an extra charge — boomed in January, up 58% from December." (More below.)
Mozilla

JavaScript Inventor Brendan Eich Named New CEO of Mozilla 112

Posted by samzenpus from the man-with-the-plan dept.
darthcamaro (735685) writes "Mozilla today announcedthat Brendan Eich would be its new CEO . Eich had been serving as Mozilla's CTO and has been with Mozilla since day one — literally day one. Eich was a Netscape engineer when AOL decided to create the open-source Mozilla project in 1998. The choice of Eich as CEO seems obvious to some, after a string of recent short-tenured CEOs at Mozilla's helm."

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