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Russians may find new life in Subglacial Lake Vostok->

Submitted by N!NJA
N!NJA writes "Those who had the privilege of watching the fascinating documentary The Lost World of Lake Vostok on BBC's Horizon, know that this lake has been buried under 4km (14,000 ft) of ice for millions of years and might be inhabited by never-before-seen species of microbes, fish, plants and animals. More about the lake on Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Vostok. Now, the Russian scientists that have drilled towards the lake since the 90's are close to reaching its waters.

After 20 years of drilling, a team of Russian researchers is close to breaching the prehistoric Lake Vostok, which has been trapped deep beneath Antarctica for the last 14 million years. Vostok is the largest in a sub-glacial web of more than 200 lakes that are hidden 4 km beneath the ice. Some of the lakes formed when the continent was much warmer and still connected to Australia. The lakes are rich in oxygen (making them oligotrophic), with levels of the element some 50 times higher than what would be found in your typical freshwater lake. The high gas concentration is thought to be because of the enormous weight and pressure of the continental ice cap.

If life exists in Vostok, it will have to be an extremophile — a life form that has adapted to survive in extreme environments. The organism would have to withstand high pressure, constant cold, low nutrient input, high oxygen concentration and an absence of sunlight. The conditions in Lake Vostok are thought to be similar to the conditions on Jupiter’s moon Europa and Saturn’s tiny moon Enceladus. In June, NASA probe Cassini found the best evidence yet for a massive saltwater reservoir beneath the icy surface of Enceladus. This all means that finding life in the inhospitable depths of Vostok would strengthen the case for life in the outer solar system.

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Android

Android malware: Symantec's credibility sinks furt->

Submitted by N!NJA
N!NJA writes "Not one week after the security group known as Symantec announced that they’d discovered the largest malware attack in the history of Android planted firmly in the guts of the official market, they’ve announced that there is no such infection. In fact, the malware the group said it’d found, Android.Counterclank, is actually just an overly-aggressive adware code. This is in accordance with a report put out by rival security group Lookout whom has essentially “told them so” late last month – always double check! [...] As Symantec notes, this software is only capable of doing a few disagreeable things to your Android device instead of a whole lot, the latter being the one that gets a code into the “malware” category. Instead, we’re only talking about the following:

“In general, it’s changing the home page of the [smartphone's] browser, adding additional shortcuts to the desktop, adding and even removing bookmarks. It took a while for some consensus then about what was adware or spyware, and what wasn’t, but eventually that consensus was reached.”
– Kevin Haley of Symantec"
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First ever audit of the Federal Reserve reveals $1->

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes "The first ever GAO (Government Accountability Office) audit of the Federal Reserve was carried out in the past few months due to the Ron Paul, Alan Grayson Amendment to the Dodd-Frank bill, which passed last year. (HR 459). The final audit. reveals an astonishing $16 trillion in secret loans made to American and foreign banks during the recent economic crisis. The investigation also revealed that the Fed outsourced most of its emergency lending programs to private contractors, many of which also were recipients of extremely low-interest and then-secret loans. This is no longer an issue of right versus left. The federal reserve is clearly a corrupt entity with no oversight, and no accountability."
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Businesses

Obama Stumped by Mystery of the Laid-Off Engineer

Submitted by theodp
theodp writes "'As a basic matter there is a huge demand for engineers around the country right now,' President Obama informed the wife of a laid-off Texas semiconductor engineer after she confronted the President on H-1B use during a Google+ hangout. 'I'd be interested in finding out exactly what's happening right there because the word we're getting is that somebody in that kind of high-tech field, that kind of engineer, should be able to find something right away. And the H-1bs should be reserved only for those companies who say they cannot find somebody in that particular field.' So, who's going to tell the President that offshore outsourcing companies dominate the top 10 list of H-1B users? Or that the NY Times says that old techies can't get hired? Or that there's no Santa Claus, Easter Bunny, or Tooth Fairy? Perhaps the President might be more in touch had he invited someone more familiar with hi-tech hiring reality to sit with Mrs. Obama at the State of the Union together with Steve Jobs' widow and the young co-founder of look-Ma-no-revenue Instagram. The Washington Post reports that the White House has followed-up by forwarding the out-of-work engineer's resume to contacts in the Dallas-Fort Worth area. So, if you're hiring, and don't believe engineering life has to end at 40, why not take a gander at EE Darin Wedel's LinkedIn profile and TI patent?"
Android

ITC throws out B&N antitrust claims against MS->

Submitted by N!NJA
N!NJA writes "Barnes & Noble's primary line of defense against Microsoft's allegations of patent infringement by the bookseller's Android-based devices has collapsed in its entirety. An Administrative Law Judge at the ITC today granted a Microsoft motion to dismiss, even ahead of the evidentiary trial that will start next Monday (February 6), Barnes & Noble's "patent misuse" defense against Microsoft. [...]

Prior to the ALJ, the ITC staff — or more precisely, the Office of Unfair Import Investigations (OUII), which participates in many investigations as a third party representing the public interest — already supported Microsoft's motion all the way. The OUII basically concluded that even if all of what Barnes & Noble said about Microsoft's use of patents against Android was accurate, it would fall far short of the legal requirements for a patent misuse defense."
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China

Forbes: Manufacturing unprofitable to China. Bring->

Submitted by N!NJA
N!NJA writes "My favourite fact of this past year was the proof that China makes almost nothing out of assembling Apple‘s iPads and iPhones. It’s a favourite because it speaks so directly to one of the great political arguments going on in both the US and the UK. I refer, of course, to this very strange idea that both countries would get (even) richer if only they would do more manufacturing. [...] If you want lots of jobs and lots of high paying jobs then you’re not going to find them in manufacturing. They’re where the money is, in the design, the software and the retailing of the products, not the physical making of them. Manufacturing is just so, you know, 20th century."
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GoDaddy still supports SOPA->

Submitted by blkwolf
blkwolf writes "The public statement that GoDaddy no longer supports SOPA was nothing but a PR move to keep people from leaving. They still wont change their position on supporting it, in the record of Congress."
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Ambiguity: Telling the truth when you don't mean to.