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Submission + - Do Not Kill Registry Launched to Help Prevent Accidental Drone Strikes (donotkill.net) 1

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: In response to the establishment of a national 'kill list' and the expansion of the United States' predator drone strike program, the National Agency for Ethical Drone-Human Interactions is pleased to announce the launch of the Do Not Kill Registry. Adding your name to the registry will assist us in avoiding accidental casualties when targeting enemy militants for predator drone strikes in our mission to make the world a safe place for Democracy and Free Enterprise.

The National Agency for Ethical Drone-Human Interactions (N.E.D.H.I.) was founded in September of 2001 to monitor and regulate the use of drones both domestically and internationally. Through an active collaboration between N.E.D.H.I., the busy pilots and operators of the U.S. drone program, and the American public, we believe that we can find the political and moral solutions needed to both protect the security of the United States while also satisfying the ethical concerns of the broader global community.
Security

Submission + - Ask Slashdot: Transparent HTTPS proxying - acceptable or abominable? (cisco.com)

Submitted by
jez9999
jez9999 writes: "I recently worked for a relatively large company that imposed so-called transparent HTTPS proxying on their network. In practice, what this means is that they allow you to use HTTPS through their network, but it must be proxied through their server and their server must be trusted as a root CA. They were using the Cisco IronPort device to do this. The "transparency" seems to come from the fact that they tend to install their root CA into Internet Explorer's certificate store, so IE won't actually warn you that your HTTPS traffic may be being snooped on (nor will any other browser that uses IE's cert store, like Chrome). Is this a reasonable policy? Is it worth leaving a job over? Should it even be legal? It seems to me rather mad to go to huge effort to create a secure channel of communication for important data like online banking, transactions, and passwords, and then to just effectively hand over the keys to your employer. Or am I overreacting?"
NASA

Submission + - Tropical lakes on Saturn moon could expand options for life (nature.com)

Submitted by ananyo
ananyo writes: Nestling among the dunes in the dry equatorial region of Saturn's moon Titan is what appears to be a hydrocarbon lake. The observation, by NASA'a Cassini spacecraft, suggests that oases of liquid methane — which might be a crucible for life — lie beneath the moon's surface.
Besides Earth, Titan is the only object in the Solar System to circulate liquids in a cycle of rain and evaporation, although on Titan the process is driven by methane rather than water. This cycle is expected to form liquid bodies near the moon's poles, but not at its dune-covered equator.
Now scientists think they have found a tropical lake — some 60 kilometres long and 40 kilometres wide, and at least 1 metre deep — in Cassini observations made between 2004 and 2008. Because tropical lakes on Titan should evaporate over a period of just a few thousand years, the researchers argue that these ponds and lakes are being replenished by subsurface oases of liquid methane. That would expand the number of places on the moon where life could potentially originate.
Programming

Submission + - The history of the CompSci degree (hp.com)

Submitted by
Esther Schindler
Esther Schindler writes: "Young whippersnappers might imagine that Computer Science degrees — and the term "computer science" — have been around forever. But they were invented, after all, and early programmers couldn't earn a college degree in something that hadn't been created yet. (The year I went to Brandeis, 1975, was the first in which one could major in CompSci; before then, anyone learning programming got a degree in Physics.)

So, where'd "computer science" come from? In The Evolution of the Computer Science Degree, Karen Heyman traces the history of the term ("Symnoetics" anyone?) and the degree, and challenges you on a geek trivia question: Which U.S. college offered the first CS degree? (It's not an obvious answer.)"
AMD

Submission + - AMD Licenses ARM Cortex A5 for integration into APUs (pcper.com)

Submitted by Vigile
Vigile writes: Today AMD made an announcement that is the first step of a drastic transition for the company by integrating an ARM Cortex A5 processor on the same die with upcoming Fusion APUs. Starting in late 2013, all AMD APUs (processors that are combinations of x86 cores and Radeon SIMD arrays) will also integrate an ARM Cortex A5 processor to handle security for online transactions, banking, identity protection and DRM integration. The A5 is the smallest Cortex processor available, and that would make sense to use it in a full APU so it will not take up more than 10-15 square mm of die space. This marks the first time AMD has licensed ARM technology and while many people were speculating a pure ARM+Radeon hybrid, this move today is being described as the "first step" for AMD down a new road of dexterity as an IP-focused technology company with their GPU technology as “the crown jewel”. So while today's announcement might focus on using ARM processors for security purposes, the future likely holds much more for these two partners.

Submission + - Why groundwater use may not explain half of sea-level rise (arstechnica.com)

Submitted by Sir Realist
Sir Realist writes: A recent Slashdot scoop pointed us at a scientific study that claimed that 42% of global sea-level rises could be due to groundwater use. It was a good story. But as is often the way with science, there are folks who interpret the data differently. Scott Johnson at ars technica has a good writeup which includes two recent studies that came to remarkably different conclusions from mostly the same data, and an explanation of the assumptions the authors were making that led to those differences. Essentially, there is some reason to think that the groundwater estimates used in the first study were too high, but thats still under debate, so its worth reading the whole argument. Scientific review in action!

Submission + - 5 Powerful App Features to Get Things Done Naturally (lightarrow.com)

Submitted by
Adi Mishra
Adi Mishra writes: "We propose a system that takes an organic view of productivity to more truly reflect how we get things done in life. This system takes into account all the real-life elements of getting things done — things beyond notes and lists of tasks. For example, with something as complex as planning an event (like a birthday party or wedding), going on a family vacation, or embarking on a large household project (major landscaping improvements), tasks and notes with simple reminders only take you so far. Many more elements are involved, such as services utilized, managing the providers for those services, shopping, bookmarks, sharing with and managing event co-hosts, travel companions, or project team-mates, in addition to a comprehensive calendar view of everything with proper reminders. LifeTopix does 5 things to make it all come together more naturally."
Linux

Submission + - Ask Slashdot: Best Linux laptops for elementary school

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Hello fellow Slasdotians! I am in need of your sage advice, insight and wisdom. I work in the tech department of an elementary school and I am trying to show the tech director the world of Linux. I will be installing edUbuntu but I am not sure which laptop to get. I know there are companies like Sytem76 that sell laptops with Linux already installed but I wanted to ask you for your thoughts. We want something small and light weight for the kids. We do not need much horsepower as the main use will be internet/email/word processing and whatever other apps come with edUbuntu. Basically, what we really want is something MacBook Air-like but not nearly as expensive. Thoughts?
Cloud

Submission + - The concept of private cloud is fundamentally flawed, says Salesforce (techworld.com)

Submitted by concertina226
concertina226 writes: Speaking at the Cloud Computing World forum in London today, JP Rangaswami said that cloud provides the scalability and flexibility that organisations need to survive in the modern age. However, organisations that choose to adopt private rather than public cloud will miss out on the benefits.

“Whenever anyone uses that phrase to you, just ask them who are you sharing costs with. If all the costs you’re sharing are just with you, you’re just kidding yourself, it ain’t a cloud” said Rangaswami.

“The only way it has value is if someone else is taking the risk, and you can step it up or down. This isn’t just a question of infrastructure; IT is not just about hardware. Your processes have to be able to scale, your ability to put things on and take things off has to be able to scale – everything you do has to be able to scale in both directions.”

What do you think? Is private cloud flawed or is Rangaswami barking up the wrong tree?
The Internet

Submission + - The 10 strangest domain name proposals (foxnews.com)

Submitted by Velcroman1
Velcroman1 writes: Apple, Sony and American Express are among companies that are seeking eponymous domain names using their brands, according to the newly revealed list of new gTLDs that have been applied for. You'd expect those big brands to buy in. But the list of domain name proposals runs the gamut from obvious to extraordinary. From .george to .ooo (with a stop at .ketchup and .plumbing) Here are the ten strangest.
Medicine

Submission + - Drug company disguised advertising as science (nature.com)

Submitted by
ananyo
ananyo writes: "A former pharmaceutical company employee has blown the whistle on drug promotion disguised as science.
Drug companies occasionally conduct post-marketing studies to collect data on the safety and efficacy of drugs in the real world, after they’ve been approved by the US Food and Drug Administration. “However,” writes the anonymous author in an editorial in the British Medical Journal (subscription), “some of the [post-marketing] studies I worked on were not designed to determine the overall risk:benefit balance of the drug in the general population. They were designed to support and disseminate a marketing message.”
According to the whistleblower, the results of these studies were often dubious. “We occasionally resorted to ‘playing’ with the data that had originally failed to show the expected result,” he says. “This was done by altering the statistical method until any statistical significance was found.” He adds that the company sometimes omitted negative results and played down harmful side effects.
Nature says it was unable to work out who the writer was but they likely worked on diabetes and the studies criticized were from the Denmark-based pharmaceutical company Novo Nordisk."
China

Submission + - Attacks Targeting US Defense Contractors and Universities Tied to China (threatpost.com)

Submitted by Trailrunner7
Trailrunner7 writes: Researchers have identified an ongoing series of attacks, possibly emanating from China, that are targeting a number of high-profile organizations, including SCADA security companies, universities and defense contractors. The attacks are using highly customized malicious files to entice targeted users into opening them and starting the compromise.

The attack campaign is using a series of hacked servers as command-and-control points and researchers say that the tactics and tools used by the attackers indicates that they may be located in China. The first evidence of the campaign was an attack on Digitalbond, a company that provides security services for ICS systems. The attack begins with a spear phishing email sent to employees of the targeted company and containing a PDF attachment.

In addition to the attack on Digitalbond, researchers have found that the campaign also has hit users at Carnegie Mellon University, Purdue University and the University of Rhode Island. Also, the Chertoff Group, a consultancy headed by former secretary of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff, and NJVC, another defense contractor, have been targeted. Carnegie Mellon and Purdue both have high-profile computer security programs.
Android

Submission + - Tablet App Development - Best Reference / Cookbooks?

Submitted by LazyBoyWrangler
LazyBoyWrangler writes: I'm an ancient Linux developer (well over thirty) who has been buried in developing and maintaining code for a couple of clients for the past ten years. One of these clients is asking me for development of a remote, secure tablet based application running on (most likely) Android due to client platform distribution cost (250-500 remote clients connecting via SSL-TCP/IP). I'm not discounting Apple either — I strongly recommend use of Apple platforms to my clients. I've got a long standing hatred of Windows platforms due to my costs/pain in supporting anything on them. I just can't afford the time and misery helping one more person with Windows, and the platform instability in terms of user interface/version changes drives me insane.

In the past, I've found O'Reilly books fit my learning style weil enuogh — I have a San Diego quality zoo, not a library. What resources do people recommend for a very experienced developer who has written hundreds of thousands of lines of secure communication / banking code?

Any thoughts?
Patents

Submission + - The "Defensive Patent License" an open defensive patent pool

Submitted by capedgirardeau
capedgirardeau writes: Via Cory Doctorow at BoingBoing:
Ars Technica's Jon Brodkin has an in-depth look at the "Defensive Patent License," a kind of judo for the patent system created by ... EFF's Jason Schultz (who started EFF's Patent Busting Project) and ... Jen Urban (who co-created the ChillingEffects clearinghouse). As you'd expect from two such killer legal freedom fighters, the DPL is audacious, exciting, and wicked cool. It's a license pool that companies opt into, and members of the pool pledge not to sue one another for infringement. If you're ever being sued for patent infringement, you can get an automatic license to a conflicting patent just by throwing your patents into the pool. The more patent trolls threaten people, the more incentive there is to join the league of Internet patent freedom fighters.
Programming

Submission + - Snopes.com debunks old C++ 'interview' hoax (networkworld.com)

Submitted by
netbuzz
netbuzz writes: "If this one has escaped your attention, the claim goes like this: “C++ designer Bjarne Stroustrup admitted in an interview that he developed the language solely to create high-paying jobs for programmers.” The 1998 “interview,” which never happened, also “quotes” Stroustrup saying all kinds of outrageous things about his motivations for designing C++, and has dogged him throughout the years, even earning a place on his Web site’s FAQ page. Last week Snopes stepped up and put its official “false” on the still-circulating versions of the fictitious “interview.” Does Stroustrup think it will help put the matter to rest? “Not really.”"
Medicine

Submission + - MIT creates glucose fuel cell to power implanted brain-computer interfaces (extremetech.com)

Submitted by
MrSeb
MrSeb writes: "Neuroengineers at MIT have created a implantable fuel cell that generates electricity from the glucose present in the cerebrospinal fluid that flows around your brain and spinal cord. The glucose-powered fuel cell is crafted out of silicon and platinum, using standard semiconductor fabrication processes. The platinum acts as a catalyst, stripping electrons from glucose molecules, similar to how aerobic animal cells (such as our own) strip electrons from glucose with enzymes and oxygen. The glucose fuel cell products hundreds of microwatts (i.e. tenths of a milliwatt), which is a surprisingly large amount — it comparable to the solar cell on a calculator, for example. This should be more than enough power to drive complex computers — or perhaps more interestingly, trigger clusters of neurons in the brain. In theory, this glucose fuel cell will actually deprive your brain of some energy, though in practice you probably won’t notice (or you might find yourself growing hungry sooner)"

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