An anonymous reader shared this report from ABC News: Elon Musk called this week for the deorbiting of the International Space Station (ISS) "as soon as possible." "It is time to begin preparations for deorbiting the [ISS]," Musk wrote in a post on X on Thursday. "It has served its purpose. There is very little incremental utility. Let's go to Mars." In a follow-up post, Musk said he was planning to recommend to President Donald Trump that the station be brought down "as soon as possible" and that the 2030 timeline for deorbiting be moved up to two years from now.
Jordan Bimm, space historian and professor of science communication at the University of Chicago, told ABC News what he thinks was one of the most important findings to come out of ISS research: "that microgravity affects the body in lots of deleterious ways." "That leads to your bone loss, muscle loss, changes in the fluid inside our bodies that are normally being pulled down by Earth's gravity, changes to the eye and vision loss and things like that. We have gotten good data on how that progresses over time, and importantly, we have developed countermeasures for these things as well, including resistance training or running on a treadmill, things like that..."

An anonymous reader shared this report from the Washington Post's "Tech Brief": Last fall, reports that Kroger was considering bringing facial recognition technology into its stores sparked outcry from lawmakers and customers. They worried personalized data could be used to charge different prices for different customers based on their shopping habits, financial circumstances or appearance. Kroger, the country's largest supermarket chain, had already been using digital price tags in its stores.

Kroger told lawmakers that it doesn't use facial recognition to help it set prices, a stance the company reiterated to the Tech Brief on Thursday. Still, the uproar helped to spark a push by consumer advocates who warn that the threat of invasive, personalized pricing schemes is real. Now, Democratic lawmakers in several states are working to ban so-called "surveillance pricing" — when businesses charge customers more or less for the same item based on their personal information.
Besides a bill in California, three more bill were introduced this month in Colorado, Georgia, and Illinois that also ban "surveillance wages," which the article defines as employers adjusting wages based on how much data an employee collects. "Both surveillance pricing and surveillance wages really disrupt fundamental ideals of fairness," University of California, Irvine law professor Veena Dubal tells the Washington Post.

Dubal is one of the consumer advocates behind a new report which notes information released last month by America's consumer-protecting FTC that "suggests that surveillance pricing tools are being actively developed and marketed across a range of industries, including consumer-facing businesses like 'grocery stores, apparel retailers, health and beauty retailers, home goods and furnishing stores, convenience stores, building and hardware stores, and general merchandise retailers such as department or discount stores." The consumer advocates (which include the Electronic Privacy Information Center) put it this way.

"Imagine walking into a grocery store and seeing a price for milk that's higher than what the next shopper pays because an algorithm calculated that you're willing to spend more..."

Google's Threat Intelligence Group notes "the growing threat to secure messaging applications." While specifically acknowledging "wide ranging efforts to compromise Signal accounts," they add that the threat "also extends to other popular messaging applications such as WhatsApp and Telegram, which are also being actively targeted by Russian-aligned threat groups using similar techniques.

"In anticipation of a wider adoption of similar tradecraft by other threat actors, we are issuing a public warning regarding the tactics and methods used to date to help build public awareness and help communities better safeguard themselves from similar threats."

Computer Weekly reports: Analysts predict it is only a matter of time before Russia starts deploying hacking techniques against non-military Signal users and users of other encrypted messaging services, including WhatsApp and Telegram. Dan Black, principal analyst at Google Threat Intelligence Group, said he would be "absolutely shocked" if he did not see attacks against Signal expand beyond the war in Ukraine and to other encrypted messaging platforms...

Russia-backed hackers are attempting to compromise Signal's "linked devices" capability, which allows Signal users to link their messaging account to multiple devices, including phones and laptops, using a quick response (QR) code. Google threat analysts report that Russia-linked threat actors have developed malicious QR codes that, when scanned, will give the threat actor real-time access to the victim's messages without having to compromise the victim's phone or computer. In one case, according to Black, a compromised Signal account led Russia to launch an artillery strike against a Ukrainian army brigade, resulting in a number of casualties... Google also warned that multiple threat actors have been observed using exploits to steal Signal database files from compromised Android and Windows devices.
The article notes that the attacks "are difficult to detect and when successful there is a high risk that compromised Signal accounts can go unnoticed for a long time." And it adds that "The warning follows disclosures that Russian intelligence created a spoof website for the Davos World Economic Forum in January 2025 to surreptitiously attempt to gain access to WhatsApp accounts used by Ukrainian government officials, diplomats and a former investigative journalist at Bellingcat."

Google's Threat Intelligence Group notes there's a variety of attack methods, though the "linked devices" technique is the most widely used. "We are grateful to the team at Signal for their close partnership in investigating this activity," Google's group says in their blog post, adding that "the latest Signal releases on Android and iOS contain hardened features designed to help protect against similar phishing campaigns in the future. Update to the latest version to enable these features."

Chinese startup DeepSeek will make its models' code publicly available, it said on Friday, doubling down on its commitment to open-source artificial intelligence. From a report: The company said in a post on social media platform X that it will open source 5 code repositories next week, describing the move as "small but sincere progress" that it will share "with full transparency."

"These humble building blocks in our online service have been documented, deployed and battle-tested in production." the post said. DeepSeek rattled the global AI industry last month when it released its open-source R1 reasoning model, which rivaled Western systems in performance while being developed at a lower cost.

A new AI tool developed by Google solved a decade-long superbug mystery in just two days, reaching the same conclusion as Professor Jose R Penades' unpublished research and even offering additional, promising hypotheses. The BBC reports: The researchers have been trying to find out how some superbugs - dangerous germs that are resistant to antibiotics - get created. Their hypothesis is that the superbugs can form a tail from different viruses which allows them to spread between species. Prof Penades likened it to the superbugs having "keys" which enabled them to move from home to home, or host species to host species.

Critically, this hypothesis was unique to the research team and had not been published anywhere else. Nobody in the team had shared their findings. So Mr Penades was happy to use this to test Google's new AI tool. Just two days later, the AI returned a few hypotheses - and its first thought, the top answer provided, suggested superbugs may take tails in exactly the way his research described.

Apple has launched the iPhone 16E, featuring a 6.1-inch OLED display, Face ID, an A18 chipset, USB-C, 48MP camera, and support for Apple Intelligence. Gone but not forgotten: the home button, Touch ID and 64GB of base storage. The Verge reports: The 16E includes the customizable Action Button, but not the new Camera Control you'll find on the 16 series. It does swap its Lightning port for USB-C, now a requirement for the phone to be sold in the EU. On the inside, there's an A18 chipset, the same chip as the iPhone 16. That makes the 16E powerful enough to run Apple Intelligence, the suite of AI tools that includes notification summaries. Even the non-Pro iPhone 15 can't do that, so the 16E is one of the most capable iPhones out there. Apple has previously confirmed that 8GB RAM was the minimum to get Apple Intelligence support in the iPhone 16 series, so it's likely that the 16E also boasts at least that much memory. It's also been bumped to a baseline of 128GB of storage, meaning there's no longer a 64GB iPhone.

There's only a single 48-megapixel rear camera; the lack of additional cameras is the biggest downgrade compared to the company's other handsets. With support for wireless charging and a water-resistant IP rating, there's little you have to give up elsewhere. The iPhone 16E is also the first iPhone to include a modem developed by Apple itself. The company has spent years trying to move away from modems developed by Qualcomm, and we're finally seeing the fruits of that labor. The big questions now are how well the new modem performs and whether Apple is ready to roll out its own connectivity components in the iPhone 17 line later this year. It's available for Friday starting at $599 with 128GB of storage.

Microsoft is reminding IT administrators that WSUS driver synchronization will be deprecated on April 18, 2025, urging them to transition to cloud-based update solutions like Windows Autopatch, Azure Update Manager, and Microsoft Intune. "For on-premises contexts, drivers will be available on the Microsoft Update catalog, but you won't be able to import them into WSUS," the company said in a Windows message center update on Tuesday. "You'll need to use any of the available alternative solutions, such as Device Driver Packages, or transition to cloud-based driver services for your organization, such as Microsoft Intune and Windows Autopatch." BleepingComputer reports: This reminder follows two other warnings issued since June 2024, announcing the deprecation of WSUS driver synchronization and encouraging customers to adopt Redmond's newer cloud-based driver services. The company also revealed in September 2024 that WSUS had been deprecated, but Microsoft added that it plans to keep publishing updates through the channel and maintain all existing capabilities. This announcement came after WSUS was listed on August 13 as one of the "features removed or no longer developed starting with Windows Server 2025."

"Specifically, this means that we are no longer investing in new capabilities, nor are we accepting new feature requests for WSUS," Microsoft's Nir Froimovici said at the time. "However, we are preserving current functionality and will continue to publish updates through the WSUS channel. We will also support any content already published through the WSUS channel."

SCMP: Chinese scientists have developed a revolutionary repair technology that could make lithium-ion batteries last over six times longer. Announcing their discovery in the journal Nature on Wednesday, the researchers said this low-cost, eco-friendly technology could soon be ready to enter the market.

The batteries are key for many modern technologies, from smartphones to electric vehicles. However, as these batteries age, they often become less efficient -- a process that cold weather accelerates. The researchers said they could counter this problem with the "injection" of a special solution to rejuvenate "sick" batteries. At present, lithium-ion batteries rely on sophisticated materials used to generate lithium ions -- whose movement through electrolyte is key to their performance -- and then protect them to ensure a decent lifespan.

Typically these lithium ions move from the positive terminal to the negative when the battery is charging, a process which is then reversed when it is generating power. The battery is considered to have expired when the supply of lithium ions runs low -- for example some electric car batteries have a lifespan of around 1,500 charge cycles -- but other components in the battery still remain in good working order after this happens. This insight prompted the two lead researchers, Gao Yue and Peng Huisheng from Fudan University's macromolecular science department, to see if they could revive a battery by replenishing the supply of active lithium ions.

Yahoo Finance shares an interesting prediction. Amazon has an "under-the-radar robot push" that "could boost its profit margins big-time, Morgan Stanley managing director Brian Nowak said." Nowak said Amazon has quietly developed six significant next-generation fulfillment centers in the past three years that bring automation front and center... Amazon now has industrial robots that can increase efficiencies across the storage, inventory management, pick and packing, and sorting order fulfillment processes.

Fulfillment costs make up about 20% of Amazon's retail revenue, so he reasoned that automation could have a significant impact on long-term operating profit potential. Nowak says if 30% to 40% of Amazon's US units were fulfilled through next-generation robotics-enabled warehouses by 2030, it could lead to $10 billion-plus of savings... The investments in robots may already be paying off. Amazon's North America retail operating margins on a trailing 12-month basis have risen for five straight quarters. North America operating margins improved to 6.2% from 4.6% a year ago.
Nowak made the remarks on a Yahoo Finance podcast (at the top of their article) after touring one of Amazon's robot-enhanced sites in Louisiana. He believes robotics can drive down Amazon's costs compared to other retailers like Target (which he sees as lagging behind Amazon on robotics).

Meanwhile workers at an Amazon facility in North Carolina held a vote Saturday on whether to unionize. But roughly 75% of the workers voted against unionization.

Leveraging AI tools like RFDiffusion and PLACER, researchers were able to design a novel enzyme capable of breaking down plastic by targeting ester bonds, a key component in polyester. Ars Technica reports: The researchers started out by using the standard tools they developed to handle protein design, including an AI tool named RFDiffusion, which uses a random seed to generate a variety of protein backgrounds. In this case, the researchers asked RFDiffusion to match the average positions of the amino acids in a family of ester-breaking enzymes. The results were fed to another neural network, which chose the amino acids such that they'd form a pocket that would hold an ester that breaks down into a fluorescent molecule so they could follow the enzyme's activity using its glow.

Of the 129 proteins designed by this software, only two of them resulted in any fluorescence. So the team decided they needed yet another AI. Called PLACER, the software was trained by taking all the known structures of proteins latched on to small molecules and randomizing some of their structure, forcing the AI to learn how to shift things back into a functional state (making it a generative AI). The hope was that PLACER would be trained to capture some of the structural details that allow enzymes to adopt more than one specific configuration over the course of the reaction they were catalyzing. And it worked. Repeating the same process with an added PLACER screening step boosted the number of enzymes with catalytic activity by over three-fold.

Unfortunately, all of these enzymes stalled after a single reaction. It turns out they were much better at cleaving the ester, but they left one part of it chemically bonded to the enzyme. In other words, the enzymes acted like part of the reaction, not a catalyst. So the researchers started using PLACER to screen for structures that could adopt a key intermediate state of the reaction. This produced a much higher rate of reactive enzymes (18 percent of them cleaved the ester bond), and two -- named "super" and "win" -- could actually cycle through multiple rounds of reactions. The team had finally made an enzyme.

By adding additional rounds alternating between structure suggestions using RFDiffusion and screening using PLACER, the team saw the frequency of functional enzymes increase and eventually designed one that had an activity similar to some produced by actual living things. They also showed they could use the same process to design an esterase capable of digesting the bonds in PET, a common plastic. The research has been published in the journal Science.

Meta unveiled on Friday Project Waterworth, a 50,000-kilometer subsea cable network that will be the world's longest such system. The multi-billion dollar project will connect the U.S., Brazil, India, South Africa, and other key regions. The system utilizes 24 fiber pairs and introduces what Meta describes as "first-of-its-kind routing" that maximizes cable placement in deep water at depths up to 7,000 meters.

The company developed new burial techniques for high-risk areas near coasts to protect against ship anchors and other hazards. A joint statement from President Trump and Prime Minister Modi confirmed India's role in maintaining and financing portions of the undersea cables in the Indian Ocean using "trusted vendors." According to telecom analysts Telegeography, Meta currently has ownership stakes in 16 subsea networks, including the 2Africa cable system that encircles the African continent. This new project would be Meta's first wholly owned global cable system.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Guardian: A groundbreaking NHS trial will attempt to boost patients' mood using a brain-computer-interface that directly alters brain activity using ultrasound. The device, which is designed to be implanted beneath the skull but outside the brain, maps activity and delivers targeted pulses of ultrasound to "switch on" clusters of neurons. Its safety and tolerability will be tested on about 30 patient in the 6.5 million-pound trial, funded by the UK's Advanced Research and Invention Agency (Aria).

[...] The latest trial will test a device developed by the US-based non-profit Forest Neurotech. In contrast to invasive implants, in which electrodes are inserted into a specific location in the brain, Forest 1 uses ultrasound to read-out and modify activity. Aria describes the device as "the most advanced BCI in the world" due to its ability to modify activity across multiple regions simultaneously. This widens potential future applications to a huge patient population affected by conditions such as depression, anxiety and epilepsy, which are all "circuit level" conditions rather than being localized in a specific brain region.

The NHS trial will recruit patients who, due to brain injury, have had part of their skull temporarily removed to relieve a critical buildup of pressure in the brain. This means the device can be tested without having to perform surgery. When placed beneath the skull, or in individuals with a skull defect, ultrasound can detect tiny changes in blood flow to produce 3D maps of brain activity with a spatial resolution of about 100 times that of a typical fMRI scan. The same implant can deliver focused ultrasound to mechanically nudge neurons towards firing, providing a way to remotely dial activity up at precise locations. Participants will wear the device on their scalp at the site of the skull defect for two hours. Their brain activity will be measured and researchers will test whether patients' mood and feelings of motivation can be reliably altered.

There are safety considerations, as ultrasound can cause tissue to heat up. Prof Elsa Fouragnan, a neuroscientist at the University of Plymouth, which is collaborating on the project, said: "What we're trying to minimize is heat. There's a safety and efficacy trade-off." She added that it would also be important to ensure that personality or decision-making were not altered in unintended ways -- for instance, making someone more impulsive. The study will run for three and a half years starting from March, with the first eight months focused on securing regulatory approval. If successful, Forest hopes to move into a full clinical trial for a condition such as depression. Aimun Jamjoom, a consultant neurosurgeon at the Barking, Havering and Redbridge university hospitals NHS trust, who is leading the project, said: "[T]he ability to offer a safer form of surgery is very exciting. If you look at conditions like depression or epilepsy, [up to] a third of these patients just don't get better. It's those groups where a technology like this could be a life-changing solution."

The U.S. released Russian cybercriminal Alexander Vinnik, who pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit money laundering through his cryptocurrency exchange BTC-e, as part of a prisoner swap that freed American schoolteacher Marc Fogel from Russian custody. The Guardian reports: Vinnik, who arrived in Moscow on a flight from Turkey on Tuesday after having been released from custody in California, is accused of owning and operating one of the largest cryptocurrency exchanges in the world, BTC-e, which prosecutors allege facilitated the transfer of billions of dollars in transactions for criminals worldwide. In May 2024, Vinnik pleaded guilty to conspiracy to launder billions of dollars through BTC-e. He was first arrested in Greece in 2017 at the request of the United States after he was charged by a US jury in a 21-count indictment.

The charges against him included money laundering, conspiracy to commit money laundering, operating an unlicensed money service business and engaging in unlawful monetary transactions, among others. Vinnik was first extradited to France from Greece, where he received a five-year prison sentence for money laundering. He was then sent back to Greece and extradited to the United States in 2022 to face US charges. The justice department described BTC-e, which was active from around 2011 to 2017, as a "significant cybercrime and online money laundering entity that allowed its users to trade in bitcoin with high levels of anonymity and developed a customer base heavily reliant on criminal activity." Prosecutors say that BTC-e processed over $9 bn worth of transactions and served over 1 million users globally, including numerous customers in the US.

US prosecutors said that the exchange was one of the "primary ways by which cyber criminals around the world transferred, laundered, and stored the criminal proceeds of their illegal activities" and accused Vinnik of operating the company with the intent to "promote" unlawful activities. Prosecutors said that he was responsible for more than $120m in losses. Vinnik, who is a nonviolent offender, is forfeiting tens of millions of dollars in assets in the exchange, according to the New York Times.

Chinese automaker BYD is offering its advanced "God's Eye" autonomous technology in mass-market EVs like the $9,500 Seagull, while expanding globally with government-backed EV initiatives. Gizmodo reports: Previously, BYD had limited its driver assistance features to higher-end models that cost more than $28,000, according to BYD CEO Wang Chuanfu. In expanding the technology to the Seagull and other cars for no extra charge, Chuanfu said "good technology should be available to everyone." Other BYD vehicles getting the addition of the technology including cars from its Ocean, Han, Song, and Yuan lineups, as well as its hybrid vehicles. "God's Eye was developed in-house by BYD and will equip the automaker's mass-market models with features commonly only found on upscale EVs such as remote parking via smartphones and autonomous overtaking on roads," the company said.

BYD says the level of autonomy present in each car will vary depending on which sensors are equipped in the cars. Some of its pricier cars, for instance, include LiDAR sensors like those found in Waymos, which can offer faster and more precise object detection than cameras alone, particularly in low-light conditions or when a roadway is obstructed by rain or fog. [...] China's government has heavily prioritized the transition to electric vehicles with strong incentives, and BYD has managed to turn a profit on its electric vehicles, a feat that has heretofore only been accomplished by Tesla. The importance to China is clear: As the world continues transitioning to EVs, the likes of BYD have been able to push into markets including Europe and South America as Western brands lose share.

Today T-Mobile announced what they're calling "the next big thing in wireless" — T-Mobile Starlink. But the real surprise is "The beta is now open for absolutely everyone — yes, even Verizon and AT&T customers — to register for free access until July."

And, as they explained to Americans watching the Super Bowl, "If you can see the sky you're connected." Now in public beta, this breakthrough service, developed in partnership with Starlink, uses straight-out-of-a-sci-fi-movie satellite and mobile communications technology to help keep people connected — even you, Verizon and AT&T customers — in the more than 500,000 square miles of the country unreached by any carrier's earth-bound cell towers. That's nearly the size of two Texases...! The beauty of the service is its simplicity: users don't need to do anything out of the ordinary. When a user's cell phone gets out of range of a cell tower, the phone automatically connects to the T-Mobile Starlink network. No need to manually connect. Messages are sent and received just as they are today on a traditional network, even group texts and reactions. And it works on most smartphones from the last four years. It's not limited to a few smartphones or operating systems...

The beta is free until July at which point T-Mobile Starlink will be included at no extra cost on Go5G Next (including variations like Go5G Next 55+), T-Mobile's best plan. Business customers will also get T-Mobile Starlink at no extra cost on Go5G Business Next, first responder agencies on T-Priority plans and other select premium rate plans. T-Mobile customers on any other plan can add the service for $15/month per line. Through February, T-Mobile customers who have registered for the beta can secure a $10/month per line Early Adopter Discount, 33% off the full price.

AT&T and Verizon customers hate dead zones, too

When your service is amazing and different, you want as many people to try it as possible. T-Mobile is giving AT&T and Verizon customers the opportunity to try out T-Mobile Starlink satellite service on their existing phones... During the beta period, Verizon and AT&T customers can experience T-Mobile Starlink text messaging for free, and once the service launches in July, it will be available for $20/month per line... More details and consumer registration can be found here.

A Vision for Universal Coverage

As T-Mobile and Starlink continue to work towards eliminating mobile deadzones, the companies welcome wireless providers from around the world to join their growing alliance, which aims to provide reciprocal roaming for all participating carriers. So far, KDDI (Japan), Telstra (Australia), Optus (Australia), One NZ (New Zealand), Salt (Switzerland), Entel (Chile & Peru), Rogers (Canada) and Kyivstar (Ukraine) are among the providers that have signed on to join the cause and launch satellite-to-mobile technology. Learn more about the alliance and how providers can join at direct.starlink.com.

"It is now 45+ years since C++ was first conceived," writes 74-year-old C++ creator Bjarne Stroustrup in an article this week for Communications of the ACM. But he complains that many developers "use C++ as if it was still the previous millennium," in an article titled 21st Century C++ that promises "the key concepts on which performant, type safe, and flexible C++ software can be built: resource management, life-time management, error-handling, modularity, and generic programming...

"At the end, I present ways to ensure that code is contemporary, rather than relying on outdated, unsafe, and hard-to-maintain techniques: guidelines and profiles." To help developers focus on effective use of contemporary C++ and avoid outdated "dark corners" of the language, sets of guidelines have been developed. Here I focus on the C++ Core guidelines that I consider the most ambitious... My principal aim is a type-safe and resource-safe use of ISO standard C++. That is:

- Every object is exclusively used according to its definition
- No resource is leaked

This encompasses what people refer to as memory safety and much more. It is not a new goal for C++. Obviously, it cannot be achieved for every use of C++, but by now we have years of experience showing that it can be done for modern code, though so far enforcement has been incomplete... When thinking about C++, it is important to remember that C++ is not just a language but part of an ecosystem consisting of implementations, libraries, tools, teaching, and more.
WG21 (and others) are working on "profiles" to enforce guidelines (though they're "not yet available, except for experimental and partial versions"). But Stroustrup writes that the C++ Core Guidelines "use a strategy known as subset-of-superset." First: extend the language with a few library abstractions: use parts of the standard library and add a tiny library to make use of the guidelines convenient and efficient (the Guidelines Support Library, GSL).
Next: subset: ban the use of low-level, inefficient, and error-prone features.

What we get is "C++ on steroids": Something simple, safe, flexible, and fast; rather than an impoverished subset or something relying on massive run-time checking. Nor do we create a language with novel and/or incompatible features. The result is 100% ISO standard C++. Messy, dangerous, low-level features can still be enabled and used when needed.
Stroustrup writes that the C++ Core Guidelines focus on rules "we hope that everyone eventually could benefit from."

• No uninitialized variables

• No range or nullptr violations

• No resource leaks

• No dangling pointers

• No type violations

• No invalidation

Bjarne Stroustrup answered questions from Slashdot readers in 2014...

The tech startup "purported to make smart home and business products," writes America's Justice Department — products that were "meant to stop package theft, prevent weather damage to packages, and make it easier for emergency responders and delivery services to find homes and businesses." Royce Newcomb "developed prototypes of his products and received local and national media attention for them. For example, Time Magazine included his eLiT Address Box & Security System, which used mobile networks to pinpoint home and business locations, on its Best Inventions of 2021 list."

But then he told investors he'd also received a grant by the National Science Foundation — one of "several false representations to his investors to deceive and cheat them out of their money... Newcomb used the money to pay for gambling, a Mercedes and Jaguar, and a mansion." He also used the money to pay for refunds to other investors who wanted out, and to pay for new, unrelated projects without the investors' authorization. During this period, Newcomb also received a fraudulent COVID-19 loan for more than $70,000 from the Small Business Administration and fraudulent loans for more than $190,000 from private lenders. He lied about Strategic Innovations having hundreds of thousands and even millions in revenue to get these loans.

Newcomb was previously convicted federally in 2011 for running a real estate fraud scheme in Sacramento. He was sentenced to more than five years in prison for that offense, and he was on federal supervised release for that offense when he committed the offenses charged in this case... Newcomb faces maximum statutory penalties of 20 years in prison and a $250,000 fine for the wire fraud charge, and 10 years in prison and a $250,000 fine for the money laundering charge...

This effort is part of a California COVID-19 Fraud Enforcement Strike Force operation, one of five interagency COVID-19 fraud strike force teams established by the U.S. Department of Justice.
SFGate writes that "Despite receiving significant funding, his startup, Strategic Innovations, never made a dime or released any products to market, according to legal documents." The owner of a California tech startup has pleaded guilty to stealing over $4 million from investors, private lenders and the U.S. government in order to live a luxurious lifestyle, the United States Attorney's Office announced Monday... When investors asked about product delays and when they'd be paid back, Newcomb made excuses and provided conflicting info, telling them that there were supply chain issues or software problems, according to the indictment. In reality, federal prosecutors said, he was using the money to travel and continue to make these lavish personal expenses.

An anonymous Slashdot reader quotes a new article from Ars Technica: On Thursday, mobile security company NowSecure reported that [DeepSeek] sends sensitive data over unencrypted channels, making the data readable to anyone who can monitor the traffic. More sophisticated attackers could also tamper with the data while it's in transit. Apple strongly encourages iPhone and iPad developers to enforce encryption of data sent over the wire using ATS (App Transport Security). For unknown reasons, that protection is globally disabled in the app, NowSecure said. What's more, the data is sent to servers that are controlled by ByteDance, the Chinese company that owns TikTok...

[DeepSeek] is "not equipped or willing to provide basic security protections of your data and identity," NowSecure co-founder Andrew Hoog told Ars. "There are fundamental security practices that are not being observed, either intentionally or unintentionally. In the end, it puts your and your company's data and identity at risk...." This data, along with a mix of other encrypted information, is sent to DeepSeek over infrastructure provided by Volcengine a cloud platform developed by ByteDance. While the IP address the app connects to geo-locates to the US and is owned by US-based telecom Level 3 Communications, the DeepSeek privacy policy makes clear that the company "store[s] the data we collect in secure servers located in the People's Republic of China...."

US lawmakers began pushing to immediately ban DeepSeek from all government devices, citing national security concerns that the Chinese Communist Party may have built a backdoor into the service to access Americans' sensitive private data. If passed, DeepSeek could be banned within 60 days.

Scientists have grown tooth-like structures using a combination of pig and human cells, marking a step toward potential alternatives to dental implants, researchers at Tufts University School of Dental Medicine reported.

The team, led by Pamela Yelick and Weibo Zhang, cultivated the structures by seeding cells into pig tooth scaffolds and implanting them in mini pigs' jaws. After two months, the bioengineered teeth developed hard tissue layers similar to natural teeth, including dentin and cementum. While not yet fully formed teeth, the structures could eventually lead to living replacements for lost teeth, addressing limitations of current titanium implants.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Guardian: For all motorists, but perhaps the Ferrari-collecting rocker Rod Stewart in particular, it will be music to the ears: researchers have developed a road surface that heals when it cracks, preventing potholes without a need for human intervention. The international team devised a self-healing bitumen that mends cracks as they form by fusing the asphalt back together. In laboratory tests, pieces of the material repaired small fractures within an hour of them first appearing. "When you close the cracks you prevent potholes forming in the future and extend the lifespan of the road," said Dr Jose Norambuena-Contreras, a researcher on the project at Swansea University. "We can extend the surface lifespan by 30%."

Potholes typically start from small surface cracks that form under the weight of traffic. These allow water to seep into the road surface, where it causes more damage through cycles of freezing and thawing. Bitumen, the sticky black substance used in asphalt, becomes susceptible to cracking when it hardens through oxidation. To make the self-healing bitumen, the researchers mixed in tiny porous plant spores soaked in recycled oils. When the road surface is compressed by passing traffic, it squeezes the spores, which release their oil into any nearby cracks. The oils soften the bitumen enough for it to flow and seal the cracks. Working with researchers at King's College London and Google Cloud, the scientists used machine learning, a form of artificial intelligence, to model the movement of organic molecules in bitumen and simulate the behaviour of the self-healing material to see how it responded to newly formed cracks. The material could be scaled up for use on British roads in a couple of years, the researchers believe. Google published a blog post with more information about the "self-healing" asphalt.