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Submission + - Fugitive child sex abuser caught by facial-recognition technology

Submitted by mrspoonsi
mrspoonsi writes: A US juggler facing child sex abuse charges, who jumped bail 14 years ago, has been arrested in Nepal, after the use of facial-recognition technology. Street performer Neil Stammer travelled to Nepal eight years ago using a fake passport under the name Kevin Hodges. New facial-recognition software matched his passport picture with a wanted poster the FBI released in January. Mr Stammer, who had owned magic shop in New Mexico, has now been returned to the US state to face trial. The Diplomatic Security Service, which protects US embassies and checks the validity of US visas and passports, had been using FBI wanted posters to test the facial-recognition software, designed to uncover passport fraud. The FBI has been developing its own facial-recognition database as part of the bureau's Next Generation Identification (NGI) programme.

Submission + - Murder suspect asked Siri where to hide a dead body (networkworld.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: A Florida man currently on trial for murder reportedly attempted to use Siri to garner ideas about where to bury the body of his dead roomate. According to police allegations, a University of Florida student named Pedro Bravo murdered his roomate via strangulation in late September of 2012 over a dispute involving Bravo's ex- girlfriend.

According to a detective working the case, Bravo subsequently fired up Siri on his iPhone and asked it "I need to hide my roomate."

Submission + - Entire South Korean Space Programme Shuts Down as Sole Astronaut Quits (ibtimes.co.uk)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: The entire South Korean space programme has been forced to shut down after its only astronaut resigned for personal reasons.

Yi So-yeon, 36, became the first Korean in space in 2008 after the engineer was chosen by the Korea Aerospace Research Institute (KARI) to lead the country's $25m space project.

Her resignation asked questions of KARI regarding whether she was the right person to lead the programme and whether the huge cost of sending her into space was a waste of taxpayer's money.

Submission + - Encrypted social network vies for disgruntled Facebook users (computerworld.com.au)

Submitted by angry tapir
angry tapir writes: With the look of Google Plus and Facebook-like elements, a new social network named "Syme" feels as cozy as a well-worn shoe. But beneath the familiar veneer, it's quite different. Syme encrypts all content, such as status updates, photos and files, so that only people invited to a group can view it. Syme, which hosts the content on its Canada-based servers, says it can't read it. "The overarching goal of Syme is to make encryption accessible and easy to use for people who aren't geeks or aren't hackers or who aren't cryptography experts," co-founder Jonathan Hershon said in an interview about the service.
Science

Submission + - CERN to Tap Unused Desktop Power to Smash Atoms (itproportal.com)

Submitted by hypnosec
hypnosec writes: Research institute CERN has launched a new project to tap into the extra computing power from the public for its Large Hadron Collider atom smashing project. According to the organisation, the LHC@home project will, for the first time, allow volunteers to aid in high-energy collisions of protons in CERN's Large Hadron Collider and in turn helping physicists to unravel the mysteries of the origin of the universe
Games

Submission + - Game Piracy Linked To Critic's Review Scores (torrentfreak.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: A new study (paper) published at the annual ACM Foundations of Digital Games conference by researchers from Copenhagen Business School and the University of Waterloo explores the magnitude of game piracy on public BitTorrent trackers. The researchers tracked 173 new game releases over a three-month period and found that these were downloaded by 12.7 million unique peers. They further show that the number of downloads on BitTorrent can be predicted by the scores of game reviewers. Overall the current paper gives a seemingly robust overview of the state of game piracy on BitTorrent. Although the results may not be all that surprising, it’s certainly refreshing to see a decent report on BitTorrent statistics every now and then.
Security

Submission + - DOS, Backdoor and Easter Egg Found in Siemens S7 (threatpost.com)

Submitted by
chicksdaddy
chicksdaddy writes: "A BlackHat presentation on Wednesday will reveal more software vulnerabilities affecting industrial controllers from Siemens, including a serious remotely exploitable denial of service vulnerability, more hard-coded administrative passwords, and even an easter egg program buried in the code that runs industrial machinery around the globe. In an interview Tuesday evening, Beresford said he has reported 18 separate issues to Siemens and to officials at ICS CERT, the Computer Emergency Response Team for the Industrial Control Sector. Siemens said it is readying a patch for some of the holes, including one that would allow a remote attacker to gain administrative control over machinery controlled by certain models of its Step 7 industrial control software."
Moon

Submission + - Earth May Once Had Two Moons (space.com)

Submitted by AaronW
AaronW writes: According to a story at space.com, Earth may once have had two moons. The smaller moon, estimated to be 750 miles (1200km) wide and only 4% of the mass of the larger moon, crashed into the far side of the larger moon which caused the features we see today on the moon. The surface of the far side of the moon is quite different than the side facing the earth, having a different composition and a much rougher terrain.
Facebook

Submission + - Germany: Facebook's Facial Recognition is illegal (gizmodo.com)

Submitted by
fysdt
fysdt writes: "Although we think it's generally a pretty nifty feature, valid concerns over the misuse of Facebook's auto-recognition tagging have lead Germany to ban it entirely. That's right—Facebook in its current state is now illegal. Deep Scheiße, Zuckerberg.

The German government—which possesses perhaps the world's most adamant privacy laws as a result of postwar abuse—considers The Book's facial recognition a violation of "the right to anonymity," The Atlantic reports."
Security

Submission + - US wants cybersecurity protection plan for cars (networkworld.com)

Submitted by
coondoggie
coondoggie writes: "As cars and other forms of transportation increasingly rely on online systems for everything from safety to onboard entertainment, the cybersecurity threat from those who would exploit such electronic control packages has also increased. That’s why the US Department of Transportation (DOT) today issued a Request For Information to the security industry to help it build a roadmap to build “motor vehicle safeguards against cybersecurity threats and assure the reliability and safety of automotive electronic control systems.”"
IBM

Submission + - IBM to Unveil Secure Open Wireless at Black Hat (threatpost.com)

Submitted by Trailrunner7
Trailrunner7 writes: Researchers from IBM's ISS X-Force plan to unveil a new system for running an open wireless network in a secure mode at the Black Hat conference here this week. The system mimics the way that Web sites browsers use digital certificates to establish a trusted connection with one another.

X-Force researchers have been working on the system for a while now and the company plans to demonstrate the technology on Thursday during the conference. One of the main problems with public wireless networks is that they're susceptible to a number of simple attacks, including passive sniffing and man-in-the-middle. The X-Force system is designed to get around these problems by using a digital certificate to assure users that they are communicating with the wireless hotspot that they think they are.
Idle

Submission + - Giant African Rat Kills with Poisonous Mohawk (ibtimes.com)

Submitted by thebchuckster
thebchuckster writes: The African crested rat has been known to kill local dogs, but researchers have just figured out how. After eating the "poison-arrow plant," the oversized rodent stores its poison-laced spit in special hollow hairs in its mohawk. Then, when a predator grabs the rat, the animal gets stung with the poison and spit-tipped hairs which can sicken and kill.

Submission + - Senators Want Secret Warrantless Wiretap Renewal (techdirt.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: A group of Senators are meeting in secret today, while most people are focused on the "debt ceiling" issue, in order to try to rush through a renewal of the FISA Amendments Act, which expressly allowed warrantless wiretapping in the US. The law isn't set to expire until next year, but some feel that the debt ceiling crisis is a good distraction to pass the extension without having to debate the issue in public. The meeting is being held in secret, but it's not classified, so people can demand to know how their Senator voted.

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