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Comment cleartext unencrypted nation-wide traffic (Score 4, Insightful) 311

by mwilliamson (#30282524) Attached to: US Congressman Announces Plans To Probe Wikileaks
So what is the big deal? This data was sent out unencrypted from many transmitters all across the nation. It would have been (and still is) very easy to intercept. There is no data security. Those considering it a secure medium have simply been mislead. Congress, as a whole, is rather ignorant of these technical concepts. There are programs that use a soundcard for data capture, but for best results make sure and use the receiver's discriminator output, not the filtered audio out. Google for "POCSAG and FLEX decoding" for all the goodies and software you need to do your own intercepts. -Michael

Comment Re:Is this statement misleading? (Score 2, Informative) 97

by mwilliamson (#29831259) Attached to: First Public White-Space Network Is Alive

Uh, no. Range is not a function of signal power. It more is a function of the overall signal/noise ratio and the sensitivity of the receiver. This includes noise introduced in the transmitter, natural/other noise, and noise introduced in the receiver. An antenna system with gain can both concentrate and attenuate signals, depending on the directivity and where its pointed.

BTW, I got over 1400 miles out of a little 0.3 watt ham signal, but thats no where near as impressive as Earth still being able to receive signals from Voyager 1 and 2 nearly 10 billion miles away. That's impressive.

-Michael

Image

Teenager Invents Cheap Solar Panel From Human Hair Screenshot-sm 366

Posted by samzenpus from the 50-watt-shampoo dept.
Milan Karki, 18, who comes from a village in rural Nepal, believes he has found the solution to the developing world's energy needs. A solar panel made from human hair. The hair replaces silicon, a pricey component typically used in solar panels, and means the panels can be produced at a low cost for those with no access to power. The solar panel, which produces 9 volts (18 watts) of energy, costs around $38 US (£23) to make from raw materials. Gentlemen, start your beards. The future of hair farming is here!
Medicine

Med Students Get Training In Second Life Hospitals 126

Posted by Soulskill from the going-for-the-virtual-kidney-high-score dept.
Hugh Pickens writes "Discover Magazine reports that although medical simulations have been around for a long time, medical schools like Imperial College London are starting to use virtual hospitals in Second Life so students can learn their way around an O.R. before they enter the real thing. The students can also test their knowledge in the Virtual Respiratory Ward by interviewing patient avatars, ordering tests, diagnosing problems, and recommending treatment. 'The real innovation in SL clinical simulations is that they bring people together in a clinical space — you are standing next to an avatar who is a real patient, and the doctor avatar to your right is a resident at Massachusetts General Hospital and the nurse to your left is at the University of Pennsylvania hospital,' says John Lester, the Education and Healthcare Market Developer at Linden Labs. The most significant benefit of SL training may be the cost. Real-life training facilities require thousands, and sometimes millions of dollars to build and maintain, while SL simulation rooms can be created for minimal costs, and accessed from anywhere in the world for the price of an internet connection. SL can also expose students to situations that a standard academic program can't duplicate: 'You can take risks that aren't safe in the real world and teach more complex subjects in three dimensions,' says Colleen Lin. 'When you're resuscitating a dummy in real life, it looks like a dummy. But you can program an avatar to look like it's choking or having a heart attack, and it looks more real to the student responsible for resuscitating it.'"
Biotech

Human Sperm Produced In the Laboratory 368

Posted by timothy from the that's-not-starting-from-scratch dept.
duh P3rf3ss3r writes "The BBC is carrying a report from a team of researchers at Newcastle University who claim to have developed a the first 'artificial' human sperm from stem cells. The research, reported in the journal Stem Cells and Development, involved selecting meristematic germ cells from a human embryonic stem cell culture and inducing meiosis, thus producing a haploid gamete. The authors claim that the resulting sperm are fully formed, mature, human sperm cells but the announcement has been greeted with mixed reaction from colleagues who claim the procedure is ethically questionable and that the gametes produced are of inferior levels of maturation."

Comment SSN is an IDENTIFIER, not AUTHENTICATOR (Score 2, Interesting) 268

by mwilliamson (#28603461) Attached to: Social Security Numbers Can Be Guessed

Anybody or organization using an SSN as both an identifier and a form of authentication is stupid, irresponsible and should be held accountable 100% for breach of whatever resource they control. The problem is in the "shared secret" type use of a damn 9-digit number, with a few of the digits already known based on state of birth.

Want a list of ssn's for every state? Here's all of them. Have fun.

-Michael

Comment Lithium, a limited natural resource? (Score 2, Interesting) 281

by mwilliamson (#28487465) Attached to: New Lithium-Air Battery Delivers 10 Times the Energy Density
It seems like this is the holy grail for electric vehicles, and we can finally stop burning dinosaur juice in our little bitty engines and realize the economies of scale of burning dinosaur farts in really big and efficient prime movers. This is all well and good, but how plentiful is lithium, and can it be recycled easily (I suspect yes)? -Michael

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