A Gamers Nexus investigation found that LG smart TVs are almost constantly logging and uploading data about owners and their homes, even while they are offline or in standby mode. "The company's TV sets scan Wi-Fi networks for nearby devices, record audio logs through their microphones, and use audio and video sampling to recognize exactly what you're watching from across the TV inputs," reports The Verge. From the report: Gamers Nexus partnered with fellow YouTubers Level1Techs and independent security researchers for the investigation, which involved testing retail LG OLEDs. Packet captures showed the TVs scanning the local area network for nearby hardware like phones or smartwatches, as well as logging location data and details of nearby Wi-Fi networks, and feeding the information back to LG Ad Solutions. Perhaps more concerningly, the TVs were capable of recording microphone audio when in standby; this continued even after the TV was disconnected from the internet, with audio files stored offline and uploaded once a connection was restored. Earlier this year, LG was found to be silently installing an adware-like app on Windows PCs that ran pop-up ads for other LG apps and even McAfee antivirus.

The FCC is proposing (PDF) a public "robocall mitigation scorecard" that would grade phone companies on how well they block illegal spam calls while avoiding false positives on the legitimate ones. "The Scorecard will empower consumers and encourage providers to continue to combat illegal robocalls by providing the public with an assessment of the effectiveness of voice service providers' efforts to protect consumers from illegal robocalls," the FCC Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau said in a public notice. Ars Technica reports: The scorecards could include call-blocking statistics along with data on customer complaints and enforcement actions. The FCC said scorecards could grade providers on a number scale, with letter grades, or by classifying providers as low risk, medium risk, or high risk. The proposed tool would rate wireless, wireline, and VoIP providers on efforts to block robocalls and their "actual results in protecting [consumers] from illegal robocalls," the FCC said. "In practice, that means moving beyond a simple administrative checklist (i.e., did the provider file the right paperwork, did they offer the right tools) and toward a composite set of metrics that reflects both operational practices and measurable outcomes, including how often legitimate calls are blocked."

Whether the tool is useful for consumers will depend on how it's designed, how easy each provider's scorecard is to find, and what data sources it relies on. The proposed scorecard would apply to domestic voice service providers with retail customers, but not telcos that operate solely as wholesale or intermediate providers. "Combatting the scourge of illegal robocalls remains the FCC's top consumer protection priority... As proposed in today's public notice, the FCC aims to develop a scorecard that will give consumers more information about the measures providers are taking to fight illegal robocalls, and it will also incentivize providers to improve their efforts," FCC Chairman Brendan Carr said in a press release.

California lawmakers have passed a bill that would legalize plug-in "balcony" solar systems, allowing residents to connect small solar panels directly to a standard wall outlet after completing a simple online registration. The systems would be capped at 1,200 watts and must meet safety requirements designed to prevent power from feeding back onto the grid during outages. KQED reports: The legislation, SB 868, sailed through the state assembly and senate with bipartisan support. The bill now moves to the governor's desk for signature. The devices can be tented in a backyard, hung off a balcony or placed on a roof. Models range from as low as $300 to $2200, depending on size. The bill would open the solar market to people who were previously left out: renters, people with unsuitable roofs, and those lacking the capital to build out a rooftop system, which can cost in the tens of thousands of dollars.

[...] If signed into law by Newsom, the legislation would exempt plug-in solar devices from what critics say is a cumbersome and expensive interconnection application process, and replace registration with a free and straightforward online form. [...] The newly passed bill outlines several device requirements. The balcony solar systems must be capped at generating 1,200 watts per home, plug into a standard outlet, offset a customer's onsite electricity use and meet state and national electrical codes. They also must be certified by an outside safety organization like Underwriters Laboratories and have a feature that would prevent electricity from feeding back into the grid if there's a power outage.

Kalshi has issued its first-ever lifetime ban to former U.S. Rep. George Santos after concluding he failed to fully cooperate with an insider-trading investigation. He is also being fined $71,356, according to a filing (PDF) on its website. Engadget reports: It was reported in June that Santos was under investigation from the Department of Justice (DOJ) and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) over insider trading. Prediction markets like Kalshi allow users to buy contracts or shares in the outcome of events. Participants don't necessarily have to wait for an event to resolve before selling these contracts and cashing in.

Santos allegedly bought contracts on Kalshi indicating that he would not attend this year's State of the Union speech after weather disrupted his travel plans. According to the CFTC, Santos then sold those contracts for a profit after claiming on social media that he would be in attendance. The former congressman is said to have made more than $17,500 through this scheme, which Kalshi reportedly detected and flagged to authorities. In July, Santos agreed to pay over $35,000 to settle the CFTC's claims against him. The agency also issued him a three-year trading ban.

Kalshi, however, doesn't plan to allow Santos back on its platform in 2029 (or anytime after that). The company confirmed to The Wall Street Journal this was the first time it had given anyone a lifetime ban and that it did so because Santos didn't fully cooperate with its investigation. He can appeal the decision to the CTFC.

California's age-verification bill has passed in its legislature — but with its open-source carve-out intact, reports the blog Linuxiac: Back in May, we reported that California lawmakers amended Assembly Bill 1856 to carve open-source operating systems out of the state's upcoming age verification requirements. Three months later, that exemption survived the legislative process intact, and the bill has cleared both chambers of the California Legislature... sending the measure to Engrossing and Enrolling, the final legislative preparation stage before it can be presented to Governor Gavin Newsom...

For operating systems that are covered, AB 1856 builds on California's Digital Age Assurance Act, which is scheduled to take effect on January 1, 2027. Under the current text, when an operating system runs on a device and includes an account setup feature, its provider must offer an interface that asks the account holder for the birth date, age, or both, of the device's primary user during account setup. The operating system must then be capable of providing a digital age signal to covered application stores and application developers through a reasonably consistent real-time API. Instead of exposing a precise birth date, the signal identifies one of four age ranges: under 13, 13 through 15, 16 through 17, or 18 and older... Covered application stores must request the signal from the operating system and make it available to developers.

"Multikernel Technologies has put out mklinux v7.0-mk2, the first public release of the multikernel Linux tree it's been building since last year," reports the blog It's FOSS: The basic premise of the project is that one physical server can run several independent Linux kernels side by side, each with its own dedicated CPUs and memory. So, the same box could run a database on one kernel and a GPU training job on another without either kernel touching the other's resources... One kernel runs as the host, controlling the machine's CPUs, memory, and PCI devices. When it spins up a new kernel instance, that instance gets its own dedicated slice of hardware and boots straight onto it using Linux's kexec mechanism, running natively rather than under a hypervisor.

The host tracks all of this through device tree overlays under /sys/fs/multikernel/, and it can shift hardware between running instances while everything stays up.

That's a different setup from both VMs and containers. A VM still puts a hypervisor and a host kernel between the app and the hardware. A container skips the hypervisor, but every tenant on the machine shares one kernel... This release only supports x86_64 hardware, though Multikernel Technologies says the architecture-specific code is already modular enough for other ports to follow later.
The article notes they're selling multiple products based on the kernel tree, including one for running AI agents in their own kernel with direct GPU access and one that promises to patch a running kernel without taking the system down.

The Linux Foundation's director of IT infrastructure says they now spend more CPU cycles "rendering commits for scrapers than we spend on all other kinds of legitimate access." At any one time, across 5 geo-distributed nodes, there are 14 CPU cores doing nothing but rendering git commits as html....

[W]hen a source is guaranteed to be LLM-free, like the entire history of kernel commits, it's worth its weight in gold as a source of training data... At the time of writing, linux.git is about 1.48 million commits. Oh, and we have about 922 forks of it on git.kernel.org — but don't worry, it's actually extremely efficient on the backend, since it's mostly the same objects in every fork. Unless, of course, you're a scraper, in which case you have, oh, several BILLION valid URLs you can scrape, only to get 922 duplicates of the same 1.48 million commits — which is exactly what the scrapers are doing. But wait, it's not just commits itself. You can also ask for patches, plain renders, diffs between arbitrary commits — cgit is happy to let you, which was perfect for the times when the Internet was for humans or crawlers who obeyed robots.txt, and is AWFUL right about now, because we can generate 1.2 METRIC BAJILLION valid URLs just for a single fork of linux.git.

Initially, this was the solution — look through the logs, find out which IPs are obvious scraper bots, and fail2ban them. At first, this was easy, because the bots helpfully told you who they were via their user-agent. Then, they wised up and started pretending that they were random vanilla browsers. So, we started banning them by IP — after all, it's easy to figure out that an IP that is trying to grab every possible commit in a 8-year-old abandoned fork of linux is not really some lone Chrome on Windows user who is just furiously clicking every link that comes across their screen. The bots then started fanning out to entire subnets, but this was still meh, because obviously an IP coming from Google Compute is just pretending to be a Firefox user...

And... that's when things turned really, really ugly. Suddenly, the crawlers were coming from millions of random residential or mobile IPs, all pretending to be random modern browsers. An IP like that would make 4-5 requests and then never show up in the logs again... They descended like swarms of locust, hit hard and fast until the system fell over and then moved on to the next target until you recovered. Then, they returned. Rinse. Repeat. They still do that — welcome to the wonderful world of "proxy SDK monetization." It's big business, and your TV is probably doing it...

Today, git.kernel.org receives about 6M daily requests demanding to see random commits. Of these, 66% are still immediately batted away with the Anubis challenge, but 33% are now solving the math and getting through to the main site — because apparently what we have to offer is worth spending a ton of cycles to calculate the Anubis challenge... With a bunch of generous assumptions, legitimate requests are only about 2% of git.kernel.org traffic — everything else are scrapers...

[W]e're turning off features to reduce the number of crawlable URLs and to gate off actions that are expensive for us to run. Expect to lose some functionality, at least when accessing our resources anonymously. Trust me, we hate it just as much as you, but at this point it's a necessity... [W]e promise to still offer all of our data for download to anyone who asks. You just may have to jump through more hoops to get it.

Sorry.

ScienceDaily reports: A microchip about the size of a grain of rice can generate a highly organized "rainbow" of light, a capability that could eventually support faster, higher-capacity 6G communications and extremely precise timing for quantum technologies. Physicists at Loughborough University, working with an international research team, demonstrated a system that produces a series of precisely spaced light frequencies. Those optical frequencies can then be converted into multiple high-frequency electromagnetic signals known as millimeter waves.

Millimeter waves are attracting growing interest for future communications because they can provide considerably more bandwidth, giving networks more room to transmit data. A major obstacle, however, has been producing these signals with the precision and stability required for advanced applications... "They could ultimately contribute to faster, higher capacity 6G networks," [said Dr. Luke Peters, of Loughborough University's Emergent Photonics Research Centre], "but the potential goes far beyond communications. These frequencies could also be used in radar systems as well as spectroscopy and astronomical instruments, helping scientists study materials and make extremely precise measurements of the universe.

"These applications are still some way off, and there are challenges to overcome before the technology can be used in real-world systems — but our latest work has tackled a major one..." A microcomb generates an extremely precise set of light frequencies arranged somewhat like the colors in a rainbow, although the light itself is invisible to the human eye. A specialized antenna can then convert those optical frequencies into millimeter waves. Earlier research demonstrated that microcombs could produce a single precise millimeter wave frequency. Generating many frequencies simultaneously could be far more useful because each could potentially serve as a separate channel for transmitting information at the same time. Achieving that, however, requires a microcomb with exceptional stability and signal quality.

In a new Nature Communications paper, the Loughborough led researchers report a system capable of doing exactly that.
Their system connects its chip-based microresonator to a much larger loop of optical fiber where laser light continuously travels through both parts of the system, according to the article.

"The team is now investigating how the microcomb system could eventually move from a laboratory experiment into practical technology."

Citrix's Desktop as a Service (DaaS) product includes a lightweight, hardened second operating system called UniconOS (once called "eLux") to offer Windows customers a write-protected file system Citrix says is secure against computer viruses and other malware. Nerds.xyz reports: According to the company, the environment remains isolated from the Windows filesystem and uses Secure Boot protections covering the shim, bootloader, kernel, and initial RAM filesystem. That separation matters when ransomware encrypts Windows or a faulty update leaves the operating system trapped in a boot loop. Instead of repairing Windows immediately, an employee can boot into UniconOS and use Citrix DaaS to access virtual applications and desktops.

Citrix SecurAccess with Chrome Enterprise provides access to internal web applications under the organization's existing security policies. In other words, UniconOS does not actually fix the damaged Windows installation. It gives employees another route to their applications while the IT department investigates or repairs Windows... [T]he installer shrinks the Windows volume, creates a new partition, copies UniconOS onto it, and registers the necessary boot entries. Windows remains the default operating system during ordinary use, although administrators can configure boot delays and fallback behavior...

The approach could prove useful following a widespread ransomware attack or another defective Windows update resembling the CrowdStrike incident of 2024. Recovery would happen independently on every compatible endpoint instead of requiring IT employees to physically handle thousands of computers.
Thanks to Slashdot reader BrianFagioli for sharing the news.

A team of researchers at Southern Illinois University Carbondale engineered yeast to create cookies that were 3D printed out of plastic waste, reports Futurism: The yeast breaks down the components of plastic compounds and agricultural byproducts like discarded plant stalks into proteins, fats, acids, and flavorings that we can eat. When these are combined together, the mixture is fed into a 3D printer that spits out cookies of any desired shape. The researchers chose to print their cookies as the Greek letter Â, creating what they call "ÂBites" — or micro bites. They haven't actually eaten one of their ÂBites yet, as they wait for university approval... "I think it has a pleasant, appealing aroma," Lahiru Jayakody, a microbiologist at SIU who led the research, told NewScientist. "And it will taste good, too. We've not tasted it, but it smells good — that's for sure — like a real cookie...."

The researchers used CRISPR gene-editing technology to reprogram yeast strains to eat polyethylene terephthalate (PET), a widely used form of plastic commonly found in disposable water bottles, food packaging, and clothes, which is rich with carbon. Before the yeast can start feasting, the PET plastics are subjected to a process called oxidative hydrothermal dissolution to break them down into smaller bits that the microbes can digest. The purported advantage of this approach is that it's environmentally friendly, using only heat, water, and oxygen. The yeast feasts on these stripped-down plastic bits, turning them into a slurry of proteins, fats, and acids that're combined with fiber, starch, and sweetener to make them more palatable. One of the yeast strains in particular was able to turn plant biomass into tasty vanilla flavorings...

[R]ight now, it's an expensive process, costing around $60 to produce a kilogram of cookies, The Guardian reported. And some experts say it's wishful thinking to believe we can 3D-print, and then eat, ourselves out of these global problems with 3D-printed, delectable treats. "We produce 400 million tons a year of plastic waste. You're not going to turn it all into cookies," Jason Hallett at Imperial College London told New Scientist. "So it's not a solution to the plastic-waste crisis. There's no way you could do this commercially. We're not gonna be eating plastic cookies."
Thanks to Slashdot reader fjo3 for sharing the article.

BMW is about to release their most screen-dependent vehicles ever, reports Car and Driver: Step into the BMW iX3, and you'll notice something is missing: real buttons. The climate controls are fettered to the center screen, as is nearly every other feature, save for a handful located in the center console — at least the window switches are still on the doors... But don't blame a desire for larger profit margins; BMW's move away from physical switchgear and toward touchscreen dependence is the fault of younger buyers, according to one executive. In an interview with CarExpert, Vikram Pawah, the CEO of BMW Group Australia, said that young buyers prefer the newer controls... According to the executive, younger customers are less patient with their technology. "They want things done quickly, and they're multitasking," Pawah said. "And we have to keep that in mind. That's how customers are evolving. They are multitasking...."

Tesla has always forced functions to its center screen; newer players such as Rivian do the same. And in recent years, established brands like Mazda and Mercedes-Benz have moved more and more functions to touchscreens.
BMW's iX3 also includes a new safety feature — a side-radar that detects if a cyclist or vehicle is approaching, and delays the release of the electronic door lock "until the danger passes."

A new survey on police license plate cameras found that "more Americans oppose these surveillance cameras than support them," reports TechCrunch: According to a new YouGov survey of 20,000 people across the U.S. that was shared exclusively with The Washington Post, 46% of respondents opposed the company's surveillance cameras in their communities, while 38% supported them. This is a reversal from last year, when the majority of survey respondents said they were in favor... The survey also reported that more respondents said the surveillance would not make them feel any safer.
TechCrunch reports that Flock CEO Garrett "faces a growing public outcry around concerns that Flock's surveillance cameras, drones, and license plate recognition technology could be misused." Responding to reports of police abusing Flock's system, Langley told CBS News " I don't think that Flock created police abuse. I think we're the first company to ever shine a light on it and build the tools to find it."

But Futurism notes that "a grand jury in Ohio declined to bring felony charges against a man accused of destroying a Flock camera earlier this month — perhaps the clearest sign yet of the country's overwhelming hatred for the surveillance gadgets." And Newsweek documents more of the backlash: Flock Chief Executive Garrett Langley recently became the subject of a doxxing campaign after his home address was circulated online by opponents of the company's technology, underscoring how deeply divisive the issue has become.
TechCrunch reports Flock's CEO is now calling for new laws — at the state level — regulating not Flock's cameras but the police officers who use them: Langley has said that state regulators should "pass bills that make [the illegal use of Flock data] a criminal offense." And during his Fox News interview, he pointed to the changes the company has already made, while also saying, "Today, it is too often that in Flock and in other technologies, there's no regulation. There's no accountability, and we think that's wrong."
But Flock has its supporters. One local police department used a 3D printer to create a fake "decoy" camera, then monitored it for five days until they arrested a Florida man for knocking it down. 404 Media suggests that because the man told officers he believed it was a camera worth between $1,000 and $5,000, he was charged with three felonies including "grand theft" and criminal mischief of property damage worth over $1,000, plus property crimes against computer equipment supplies.

Ironically, days earlier the City Council was already considering a resolution to end their city's use of Flock cameras altogether...