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Privacy

Tor Usage More Than Doubles In August 186

Posted by timothy from the gee-fellas-I-wonder-why dept.
hypnosec writes that the Tor network has witnessed a massive rise in the number of users connecting to it for the month of August. "The privacy-enhancing network is known for providing an anonymous browsing experience through the use of a series of encrypted relays, and has had as many as 500k users throughout this year so far. But if we check the latest statistics available through Tor Metrics Portal there has been a whopping 100 percent increase in the number of Tor clients and as many as 1,200,000 users are connecting to the network. The previous peak for the network was in January 2012, when it saw as many as 950,000 users."
AT&T

Mobile Virtual Networks Are Booming Again 79

Posted by timothy from the save-it-for-the-mortgage-payment dept.
Hugh Pickens DOT Com writes "Sue Marek reports at Fierce Wireless that the mobile virtual network operator business is booming again, with new MVNOs launching nearly every week and operators like Sprint and T-Mobile hungry for MVNO partners because MVNOs offer a good economic return and can help them to grow their market share and reach into markets where they might not have visibility. 'It's a good strategic play for us,' says Matt Carter, president of Sprint wholesale and emerging solutions. 'It's another army to help us garner more subscribers on the network.' But unlike the MVNO craze of the 2005-2006 era--highlighted by high-profile failures like ESPN Mobile, Disney Mobile, Amp'd Mobile and Helio, today's high-profile MVNOs like FreedomPop, Republic Wireless, Solavei and Ting offer innovative service plans, marketing techniques and, in some cases, devices that they hope will draw consumers to their offerings. Today's MVNOs can be successful with a seemingly tiny number of customers. For example, Tucows' MVNO Ting, which sells mobile usage by minutes, text messages and megabytes, announced they currently have around 25,000 total customers, and that the business is on track to cross the break-even threshold in the fourth quarter of this year. Virtual carriers now also get the latest phones like the Moto X at launch and don't have to wait for new Android handsets to trickle down."
Transportation

Uber Tip-Skimming Allegations Could Spark National Class Action 167

Posted by timothy from the whereas-the-current-taxi-cartels-are-just-groovy dept.
curtwoodward writes "Uber has just raised a monster investment round that valued the company at some $3.5 billion. And it looks like some of that cash will have to be earmarked for more legal expenses. The startup, which offers an easy-to-use mobile app for hailing "black car" sedans and other rides, is being sued in federal court over allegations that it's illegally skimming the tips paid to drivers. The lawsuit also claims that Uber is misclassifying its drivers as contractors, rather than employees. The upshot: If the federal judge certifies this as a national class action, Uber could be facing millions of dollars in potential damages. Oh, and the lawyer behind it? She's made a career out of suing companies for exactly these kind of violations."
Microsoft

Elop Favored By Gamblers As Microsoft's Next Chief Executive 196

Posted by samzenpus from the smart-money dept.
PolygamousRanchKid writes "A gambling website's favorite as Microsoft Corp.'s next chief executive officer is Stephen Elop, the Nokia CEO who has presided over a 62 percent decline in market value. Elop, a former Microsoft executive, has 5-to-1 odds to be hired as Steve Ballmer's replacement, according to Ladbrokes, the U.K.-based gambling operator. He leads a pool including internal candidates Kevin Turner and Julie Larson-Green and outsiders like Apple CEO Tim Cook — a 100-to-1 dark horse."
The Almighty Buck

How One Man Turns Annoying Cold Calls Into Cash 227

Posted by samzenpus from the hoisting-with-his-own-petard dept.
First time accepted submitter georgeaperkins writes "A man targeted by marketing companies is making money from cold calls with his own premium-rate phone number. So far he's made £300 profit following a £10+VAT initial investment. The premium rate regulator has 'strongly discouraged' the practice, as it violates the code of practice. Nevertheless, the novel idea is sure to resonate with everyone worn down by mindless cold calling!"
Image

Pastafarian Wins Battle To Wear Colander In License Photo Screenshot-sm 535

Posted by samzenpus from the how-do-you-like-me-now dept.
An anonymous reader writes "Eddie Castillo is the first American to successfully have his government-issued photo identification taken while wearing a colander, though DPS officials are reportedly planning to follow up with Castillo in order to 'rectify' the situation. Others have tried unsuccessfully, and Castillo told KLBK that he was surprised at his victory, which he called a 'political and religious milestone for all atheists everywhere.'" Two years ago Niko Alm won the right to wear a pasta strainer on his head although Austrian authorities required him to obtain a doctor's certificate that he was "psychologically fit" to drive.
Privacy

France To Open Preliminary Investigation About PRISM Program 98

Posted by samzenpus from the getting-to-the-bottom-of-it dept.
An anonymous reader writes "Paris' prosecutor office opened a preliminary investigation after a complaint by two human rights associations who hope to determine the roles played by companies in the PRISM program. Two million communications (phone calls, SMS and mails) are said to have been intercepted in France by U.S. agencies."
Google

Google Patents "Scroogling" 135

Posted by samzenpus from the check-out-these-offers dept.
theodp writes "In Microsoft's eyes, the idea of scanning Gmail so advertisers can bid on access to those suffering from breast cancer, bi-polar disorder, depression, and panic anxiety, deserves no kudos. The USPTO, on the other hand, feels it deserves a patent. GeekWire reports that Google has been awarded a patent on "Scroogling", aka its system and method for targeting information based on message content in a reply. Google takes some jabs at Microsoft in the diagrams accompanying the patent, including one implying that MS-Access and Excel files pose security risks, and another that suggests alternatives to Access."
Idle

Bitcoin, BYOD, Phablet, Selfie, and Twerking Find Place In Oxford Dictionary 131

Posted by samzenpus from the you-keep-using-that-word-I-do-not-think-it-means-what-you-think-it-means dept.
hypnosec writes "The Oxford Dictionaries Online (ODO) has been updated today to include some of the widely used tech words like Bitcoin, BYOD, Phablet, Selfie, and Twerking among others. Some of the other common tech words which have found a place in the dictionary are 'click and connect', 'digital detox', 'FOMO', 'geek chic', 'hackerspace', 'Internet of Things', 'MOOC', 'selfie', and 'TL;DR'."
Moon

Scottish Academic: Mining the Moon For Helium 3 Is Evil 462

Posted by samzenpus from the hold-the-cheese dept.
MarkWhittington writes "Tony Milligan is a teaching fellow of philosophy at the University of Aberdeen and is apparently concerned about helium 3 mining on the moon. In a recent paper he suggested that it should not be allowed for a number of reasons which include environmental objections, his belief that the moon is a cultural artifact, and that too much access to energy would be bad for the human race."
Earth

Fukushima Daiichi Water Leak Raised To Level 3 Severity 92

Posted by samzenpus from the when-leveling-up-is-bad dept.
AmiMoJo writes "Japan's nuclear regulators have raised the level of severity of the radioactive water leak from a tank at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant. It is now a level-3 serious incident. The revision from level 1 is based on estimates of the volume of radioactive substances leaked. The International Atomic Energy Agency supports the revision. They say the tank leak can be assessed separately from the Fukushima Daiichi crisis as a level 3 incident. Japanese experienced a level-3 nuclear event in 1997 with the fire and explosions at a fuel reprocessing plant in Tokai Village, Ibaraki Prefecture. 37 workers there were exposed to the leaked radioactive substances."
Education

Ask Slashdot: Hands-On Activity For IT Career Fair 121

Posted by samzenpus from the craft-time dept.
First time accepted submitter MConnolly writes "I participate in an annual career fair for High School Sophomores. I have groups of 10 — 20 students for 40 minutes a piece. In previous years, we've brought a bunch of retired PCs and challenged the groups to disassemble (down to the motherboard) and reassemble them in working order. Many processors and motherboards died, but everyone had fun. Most students today only have laptops and tablets. As a result, this knowledge doesn't translate into the real world anymore (perhaps you disagree). I'm looking for suggestions for an activity that will give the students some hands-on, real world experience that will benefit them immediately."
Science

Scientists Create 'Fastest Man-Made Spinning Object' 159

Posted by Soulskill from the 'round-and-'round dept.
dryriver sends this news from the BBC: "A team of researchers claims to have created the world's fastest spinning man-made object. They were able to levitate and spin a microscopic sphere at speeds of up to 600 million revolutions per minute. This spin speed is half a million times faster than a domestic washing machine and more than a thousand times faster than a dental drill. The work by the University of St Andrews scientists is published in Nature Communications. Although there is much international research exploring what happens at the boundary between classical physics and quantum physics, most of this experimental work uses atoms or molecules. To do this they manufactured a microscopic sphere of calcium carbonate only four millionths of a meter in diameter. The team then used the minuscule forces of laser light to hold the sphere with the radiation pressure of light — rather like levitating a beach ball with a jet of water. They exploited the property of polarization of the laser light that changed as the light passed through the levitating sphere, exerting a small twist or torque. Placing the sphere in vacuum largely removed the drag due to any gas environment, allowing the team to achieve the very high rotation rates. In addition to the rotation, the team observed a 'compression' of the excursions or 'wobble' of the particle in all three dimensions, which can be understood as a 'cooling' of the motion. Essentially the particle behaved like the world's smallest gyroscope, stabilizing its motion around the axis of rotation."
Games

Study Suggests Violent Video Games May Make Teens Less Violent 120

Posted by Soulskill from the rovio-cancels-development-on-melancholy-birds dept.
barlevg writes "A new paper is out in the Journal of Youth and Adolescence which shows no positive correlation between playing violent video games and acts of aggression. The study of 377 children with attention deficit and depressive symptoms in fact showed a slight negative correlation between video game-playing and aggressive behavior such as bullying, which the researchers posit is due to the games awarding some measure of catharsis. The full paper is available online (PDF)."
Image

Mini-Brains Grown In the Lab 170

Posted by Soulskill from the brain-and-brain-what-is-brain dept.
fustakrakich sends news that researchers from the Austrian Academy of Sciences have used embryonic stem cells to grow a tiny human brain in a laboratory. The miniature brain, roughly the size of a pea, is at the same level of development as that of a 9-week-old fetus. From the BBC: "They used either embryonic stem cells or adult skin cells to produce the part of an embryo that develops into the brain and spinal cord - the neuroectoderm. This was placed in tiny droplets of gel to give a scaffold for the tissue to grow and was placed into a spinning bioreactor, a nutrient bath that supplies nutrients and oxygen. The cells were able to grow and organise themselves into separate regions of the brain, such as the cerebral cortex, the retina, and, rarely, an early hippocampus, which would be heavily involved in memory in a fully developed adult brain. The tissues reached their maximum size, about 4mm (0.1in), after two months. The 'mini-brains' have survived for nearly a year, but did not grow any larger. There is no blood supply, just brain tissue, so nutrients and oxygen cannot penetrate into the middle of the brain-like structure."

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