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Submission + - AWS will pay devs to verify Rust standard library because of 7,500 unsafe functi (devclass.com)

Submitted by sean-it-all
sean-it-all writes: AWS will pay developers to verify RUST standard library. How much is unclear at this stage. The issue stems from unsafe operations in RUST standard library where access to operating system can cause issues such as a null reference exception.

"The issue AWS highlights is that even if developers use only safe code, most applications still depend on the Rust standard library. AWS states that there are approximately 7.5K unsafe functions in the Rust Standard Library and notes that 57 âoesoundness issuesâ and 20 CVEs (Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures) have been reported in the last three years. The cloud giant also claimed that âoethe rate of change of the standard libraries is faster and more unsound.â "

"The Rust Foundation says that there is a financial reward tied to each challenge, and that the âoechallenge rewards committee is responsible for reviewing activity and dispensing rewards.â How much will be paid though is not stated."

Submission + - School Did Nothing Wrong When It Punished Student For Using AI, Court Rules (arstechnica.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: A federal court yesterday ruled against parents who sued a Massachusetts school district for punishing their son who used an artificial intelligence tool to complete an assignment. Dale and Jennifer Harris sued Hingham High School officials and the School Committee and sought a preliminary injunction requiring the school to change their son's grade and expunge the incident from his disciplinary record before he needs to submit college applications. The parents argued that there was no rule against using AI in the student handbook, but school officials said the student violated multiple policies.

The Harris' motion for an injunction was rejected in an order (PDF) issued yesterday from US District Court for the District of Massachusetts. US Magistrate Judge Paul Levenson found that school officials "have the better of the argument on both the facts and the law."

"On the facts, there is nothing in the preliminary factual record to suggest that HHS officials were hasty in concluding that RNH [the Harris' son, referred to by his initials] had cheated," Levenson wrote. "Nor were the consequences Defendants imposed so heavy-handed as to exceed Defendants' considerable discretion in such matters." "On the evidence currently before the Court, I detect no wrongdoing by Defendants," Levenson also wrote.

Submission + - Does the Internet route around damage? Looks like it. (ripe.net)

Submitted by Zarhan
Zarhan writes: On Sunday and Monday, two undersea cables in Baltic sea were cut. There is talk of a hybrid operation by Russia against Europe, and a Chinese ship has been detained by Danish Navy. However, the interesting part is did the cuts really have any effect, or does the Internet actually route around damage? RIPE tests seem to indicate so.. RIPE Atlas probes did not observe any noticeable increase of packet loss and only a minimal and perfectly expected increase of latency as traffic automatically switched itself to other available paths.

Submission + - NASA Wants SpaceX and Blue Origin To Deliver Cargo To the Moon (theverge.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: After asking both SpaceX and Blue Origin to develop cargo landers for its Artemis missions, NASA has announced plans to use those landers to deliver heavy equipment to the Moon. The agency wants Elon Musk’s SpaceX to use its Starship cargo lander to deliver a pressurized rover to the Moon “no earlier” than 2032, while Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin will be tasked with delivering a lunar surface habitat no sooner than 2033. Both launches will support NASA’s Artemis missions, which aim to bring humans back to the Moon for the first time in over 50 years.

Both companies are developing human landing systems for Artemis missions — SpaceX for Artemis III and Blue Origin for Artemis V. NASA later asked both companies to develop cargo-hauling variants of those landers, capable of carrying 26,000 to 33,000 pounds of equipment and other materials to the Moon. NASA says it will issue proposals to SpaceX and Blue Origin at the beginning of next year.

Submission + - Windows 95 used three different operating systems during setup (techspot.com)

Submitted by jjslash
jjslash writes: Veteran Microsoft engineer Raymond Chen recently addressed a retro-tech question from a game developer on X. The developer asked about the three user interfaces in the Windows 95 setup process, transitioning from DOS to Windows 3.x and finally to the Win9x GUI. Chen explained this design minimized the code needed for the setup.

With over 30 years of experience shaping the evolution of Windows, Chen holds deep insights into the hidden intricacies of one of the worlds most widely used software platforms. Writing The Old New Thing blog, he said Windows 95 setup was designed to upgrade systems from three possible starting points – MS-DOS, Windows 3.1, and Windows 95 itself. This necessity dictated the need for compatibility with three distinct computing environments.

Submission + - Ukraine fires UK-made Storm Shadow missiles into Russia (aljazeera.com) 1

Submitted by easyTree
easyTree writes: Ukraine fires UK-made Storm Shadow missiles into Russia

Russia’s foreign intelligence chief says attempts by NATO countries to help Ukraine will not go unpunished.

Ukraine has fired long-range British Storm Shadow missiles into Russian territory for the first time, a day after launching United States-made long-range missiles into the country, British media outlets report.

Russian war correspondent accounts on Telegram posted footage on Wednesday they said included the sound of the missiles striking in the Kursk region, which lies on Ukraine’s border. At least 14 huge explosions can be heard, most of them preceded by the sharp whistle of what sounds like an incoming missile. The footage, shot in a residential area, showed black smoke rising in the distance.

People in Kursk also reportedly found fragments from the missiles in the region.

A spokesperson for British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said his office would not be commenting on reports or operational matters.

Britain had previously said Ukraine could use Storm Shadow cruise missiles within Ukrainian territory, but

London has been pressing Washington for permission to allow their use to strike targets inside Russia for several months.

On Tuesday, Ukraine used US-made long-range weapons to strike targets in Russia. US President Joe Biden’s administration has allowed Kyiv to use these missiles in and around the Kursk region only.

Afterwards, Russian President Vladimir Putin lowered the threshold for a nuclear strike in response to a broader range of conventional attacks. Washington said afterwards it had not seen any reason to adjust its nuclear posture while China called for restraint. See article for more...

Submission + - China vessel cut 2 subsea cables linking Finland-Germany and Sweden-Lithuania (x.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: The Chinese vessel Yi Peng 3 has been chased, intercepted, and boarded by Danish Navy vessel Y311 Søløven after the Chinese vessel destroyed 2 undersea telecom cables linking Finland-Germany and Sweden-Lithuania.

The vessel sailed from Russia & the captain is Russian

Submission + - Thomas E. Kurtz, Co-Inventor of BASIC, Passes Away at Age 96 (hackaday.com)

Submitted by GFS666
GFS666 writes: It’s with sadness that we note the passing of Thomas E. Kurtz, on November 12th. He was co-inventor of the BASIC programming language back in the 1960s, and though his creation may not receive the attention in 2024 that it would have done in 1984, the legacy of his work lives on in the generation of technologists who gained their first taste of computer programming through it. Link Here: https://hackaday.com/2024/11/1... and here: https://computerhistory.org/bl...

Submission + - One Argument Why Data Caps Are Not A Problem (fierce-network.com)

Submitted by NoWayNoShapeNoForm
NoWayNoShapeNoForm writes: OpenVault believes that data caps on broadband are not a problem because most people do not exceed their existing data caps. OpenVault contends that people that do exceed their broadband data caps are simply being forgetful — leaving a streaming device on 24x7, or deploying unsecure WiFi access points, or reselling their service within an apartment building.

Yes, there may be some ISPs that have older networks that they have not upgraded. Or maybe they are unable to increase network capacity in "the middle mile" of their networks, but the Covid pandemic certainly encouraged many ISPs to upgrade their networks and capacity while many ISPs that had broadband data caps ended that feature.

Perhaps the biggest problem, according to OpenVault, is that most broadband users do not really have any idea how much bandwidth they 'consume' every month. If Internet access is a service that people want to treat as a "utility", then you have to ask, "Would they keep the water running after finishing their shower?"

Submission + - Modern 2024 PC with a vintage DOS twist (yeokhengmeng.com)

Submitted by yeokm1
yeokm1 writes: If I were to tell you a PC has a floppy drive, optical drive, Sound Blaster card, serial, parallel and PS/2 ports running DOS, you would think I’m referring to a machine from the 1990s. But my very modern PC built in 2024 possess these characteristics!

Here I share my journey on how I managed to get DOS installed and working reasonably well on such a modern system with Ryzen 5 7600 and Geforce 4060 Ti.

The fact that a 30-year-old MS-DOS 6.22 can still work well enough on such a modern hardware is testament to the efforts made by the industry to ensure good x86 PC backward compatibility. AMD, Nvidia and Asus deserve to be commended on their efforts here.

Submission + - A Quarter Million Comcast Subscribers Had Data Stolen From Debt Collector (theregister.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Comcast says data on 237,703 of its customers was in fact stolen in a cyberattack on a debt collector it was using, contrary to previous assurances it was given that it was unaffected by that intrusion. That collections agency, Financial Business and Consumer Solutions aka FBCS, was compromised in February, and according to a filing with Maine's attorney general, the firm informed the US cable giant about the unauthorized access in March. At the time, FBCS told the internet'n'telly provider that no Comcast customer information was affected. However, that changed in July, when the collections outfit got in touch again to say that, actually, the Comcast subscriber data it held had been pilfered.

Among the data types stolen were names, addresses, Social Security numbers, dates of birth, and the Comcast account numbers and ID numbers used internally at FBCS. The data pertains to those registered as customers at "around 2021." Comcast stopped using FBCS for debt collection services in 2020. Comcast made it clear its own systems, including those of its broadband unit Xfinity, were not broken into, unlike that time in 2023. FBCS earlier said more than 4 million people had their records accessed during that February break-in. As far as we're aware, the agency hasn't said publicly exactly how that network intrusion went down. Now Comcast is informing subscribers that their info was taken in that security breach, and in doing so seems to be the first to say the intrusion was a ransomware attack. [...]

FBCS's official statement only attributes the attack to an "unauthorized actor." It does not mention ransomware, nor many other technical details aside from the data types involved in the theft. No ransomware group we're aware of has ever claimed responsibility for the raid on FBCS. When we asked Comcast about the ransomware, it simply referred us back to the customer notification letter. The cableco used that notification to send another small middle finger FBCS's way, slyly revealing that the agency's financial situation prevents it from offering the usual identity and credit monitoring protection for those affected, so Comcast is having to foot the bill itself.

Submission + - Leaked DOD Memos Indicate US Soldiers Were Exposed to Potentially Toxic Agents (x.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Leaked Military Memos Indicate US Soldiers Were Exposed to Potentially Toxic Agents Including Radioactive Materials After Iran’s Jan 2020 Ballistic Missile Attack On Their Base

Retired Army JAG Says Both The Courts And The Biden-Harris DOJ Have “Sided with Iran.”

Injured Service Members Blocked From Suing Iran Abandoning Long Standing Precedent

“It’s not about getting Iran to pay, it’s about holding them accountable.”

“We’re going to have another Agent Orange.”

Submission + - Senator calls out John Deere for frustrating repair, violating federal law (substack.com)

Submitted by chicksdaddy
chicksdaddy writes: The Fight to Repair Newsletter is reporting that U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren is calling out agricultural equipment giant John Deere for possible violations of the federal Clean Air Act and a years-long pattern of thwarting owners’ ability to repair their farm equipment.

Deere “appears to be evading its responsibilities under the Clean Air Act to grant customers the right to repair their own agricultural equipment.” That is costing farmers an estimated $4.2 billion annually “causing them to miss key crop windows on which their businesses and livelihoods rely,” Warren wrote in a letter (https://www.theverge.com/2024/10/3/24260513/john-deere-right-to-repair-elizabeth-warren-clean-air-act) dated October 2nd.

The letter from Warren, a Senator from Massachusetts and strong repair advocate, is just the latest volley lobbed at Illinois-based Deere, an iconic American brand and the largest supplier of agricultural equipment to farms in the U.S. Deere controls an estimated 53 percent of the U.S. market for large tractors and 60 percent of the U.S. market for farm combines.
In recent weeks, Deere faced criticism, including from Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump, after laying off close to 2,000 U.S. based employees at facilities in Iowa and Illinois, moving many of those jobs to facilities in Mexico. (https://www.dtnpf.com/agriculture/web/ag/equipment/article/2024/07/24/deere-lays-undisclosed-number) The company has also been repeatedly called out for complicating repair and service of its farm equipment — often relying on software locks and digital rights management to force farmers to use Deere dealers and authorized service providers for even the simplest repairs. (https://pirg.org/arizona/resources/deere-in-the-headlights-ii-2/)

Submission + - Google Pay Users Alarmed by Bug Triggering Erroneous "New Card Added" Emails (9to5google.com)

Submitted by apcyberax
apcyberax writes: A glitch causes expired and current payment methods to reappear, sparking confusion among users receiving multiple alerts.

A bug on Google’s end is causing expired payment methods that even have old addresses to reappear. There are some reports of cards currently in use appearing, while a few people say they are seeing unfamiliar payment methods, though this isn’t confirmed.

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