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Submission + - Apples Fixes Three Zero Days Used in Government Targeted Attack

Submitted by Trailrunner7
Trailrunner7 writes: Apple has patched three critical vulnerabilities in iOS that were identified when an attacker targeted a human rights activist in the UAE with an exploit chain that used the bugs to attempt to remotely jailbreak and infect his iPhone.

The vulnerabilities include two kernel flaws and one in WebKit and Apple released iOS 9.3.5 to fix them. The attack that set off the investigation into the vulnerabilities targeted Ahmed Mansoor, an activist living in the UAE. Earlier this month, he received a text message that included a link to what was supposedly new information on human rights abuses. Suspicious, Manor forwarded the link to researchers at the University of Toronto’s Citizen Lab, who recognized what they were looking at.

“On August 10 and 11, 2016, Mansoor received SMS text messages on his iPhone promising “new secrets” about detainees tortured in UAE jails if he clicked on an included link. Instead of clicking, Mansoor sent the messages to Citizen Lab researchers. We recognized the links as belonging to an exploit infrastructure connected to NSO Group, an Israel-based ‘cyber war’ company that sells Pegasus, a government-exclusive “lawful intercept” spyware product,” Citizen Lab said in a new report on the attack and iOS flaws.

Submission + - Comcast & Time Warner merger died

Submitted by andyring
andyring writes: According to Bloomberg News, the Time Warner/Comcast merger of raw evil is dead. Comcast plans as early as tomorrow to withdraw the merger proposal, "after regulators decided that the deal wouldn’t help consumers, making approval unlikely" according to the story.

Submission + - Court overturns Dutch data retention law, privacy more important (dutchnews.nl) 1

Submitted by wabrandsma
wabrandsma writes: DutchNews.nl writes:
Internet providers no longer have to keep their clients phone, internet and email details because privacy is more important, a Dutch court ruled on Wednesday.

Digital Rights organisation Bits of Freedom writes in a Blog:
The law’s underlying European directive was meant as a tool in the fight against serious crimes. The Dutch law, however, is much more expansive, including everything from terrorism to bike theft. During the hearing, the state’s attorneys avowed that the Public Prosecution does not take the law lightly, and would not call on the law to request data in case of a bicycle theft. The judge’s response: it doesn’t matter if you exploit the possibility or not, the fact that the possibility exists is already reason enough to conclude that the current safeguards are unsatisfactory.

Submission + - Australia Plans to Drill 2,000-Year-Old Ice Core in Antarctica

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Australia announced Saturday a new project to drill a deep ice core in Antarctica, which may shed light on past climatic conditions in the continent. The project, Aurora Basin North project, will involve researchers drilling a 2,000-year-old ice core, in order to search for the scientific "holy grail" of the ice core.
Intel

The Big Technical Mistakes of History 244

Posted by kdawson from the seemed-like-a-good-idea-at-the-time dept.
An anonymous reader tips a PC Authority review of some of the biggest technical goofs of all time. "As any computer programmer will tell you, some of the most confusing and complex issues can stem from the simplest of errors. This article looking back at history's big technical mistakes includes some interesting trivia, such as NASA's failure to convert measurements to metric, resulting in the Mars Climate Orbiter being torn apart by the Martian atmosphere. Then there is the infamous Intel Pentium floating point fiasco, which cost the company $450m in direct costs, a battering on the world's stock exchanges, and a huge black mark on its reputation. Also on the list is Iridium, the global satellite phone network that promised to make phones work anywhere on the planet, but required 77 satellites to be launched into space."
Technology

Submission + - Augmented Reality Browsers (augmentedplanet.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: If you have ever used one of the popular augmented reality browsers like Layar or Wikitude, have you ever wondered how they compare head to head? If not have you ever wondered if you can use your phone to find a good restaurant or point out popular sights around the world?

This is a two part head to head where the blogger has tested several mobile augmented reality browsers and their ability to find places to eat and function as a tourist guide by identifying tourist attractions in London.

This is the first review I have seen where all the browsers have been compared together, what's interesting is all the browsers use different data sources so either miss popular location so give the wrong location.

Interesting read and a good analysis

Part I
http://www.augmentedplanet.com/2009/11/augmented-reality-browsers-head-to-head-part-1

Part II
http://www.augmentedplanet.com/2009/11/ar-browsers-head-to-head-test-2
Security

Submission + - First Apple iPhone worm discovered 1

Submitted by Unexpof
Unexpof writes: Users of jailbroken iPhones in Australia are reporting that their wallpapers have been changed by a worm to an image of 80s pop icon Rick Astley. This is the first time a worm has been reported in the wild for the Apple iPhone.

According to a report by Sophos The worm, which exploits users who have installed SSH and not changed the default password, hunts for other vulnerable iPhones and infects them.

Users are advised to properly secure their jailbroken iPhones with a non-default password, and Sophos says the worm is not harmless, despite its graffiti-like payload:

"Accessing someone else's computing device and changing their data without permission is an offence in many countries — and just as with graffiti there is a cost involved in cleaning-up affected iPhones... Other inquisitive hackers may also be tempted to experiment once they read about the world's first iPhone worm. Furthermore, a more malicious hacker could take the code written by ikee and adapt it to have a more sinister payload."

Images of the Rick Astley wallpaper displayed on infected phones, complete with the message "ikee is never going to give you up" are published here.

Submission + - Stable integration of renewables in the power grid

Submitted by diegocgteleline.es
diegocgteleline.es writes: One of the most frequently raised arguments against renewable power sources is that they can only supply a low percentage of the total power because the unpredictability can unstabilize the grid. Spain seem to have proved the contrary: In the last 3 days, the wind power generation records with respect the total demand were beat two times, (in special conditions: a very windy weekend, during nigth): 45% day 5 and 53% (spanish) last night. There was no unstability. How it was done? There's a Control Center that processes meteorologic data from the whole country and predicts, with high certainty, the wind and solar power that will be generated, allowing a stable integration of all the renewable power. You can see a graphic of the record here.
Technology

Submission + - MIT grad to make digital 'SixthSense' open source (rediff.com)

Submitted by yuveraj
yuveraj writes: If Pranav Mistry has his way, people around the world can build their own wearable 'SixthSense' — which uses a camera that understands human gestures — at a cost of less than Rs 15,000 ($300) by obtaining the software he developed for free in the next few months.
Medicine

Submission + - Landmark Health Insurance Bill Passes House 1

Submitted by theodp
theodp writes: A hastily-crafted amendment imposing tough new restrictions on abortion coverage in insurance policies helped pave the way for the House to approve the Democrats' bill to overhaul the nation's health insurance system. "It provides coverage for 96 percent of Americans," said Rep. John Dingell. Rep. Candice Miller disagreed, calling the legislation "a jobs-killing, tax-hiking, deficit-exploding" bill. The 1,990-page, $1.2 trillion legislation passed by a vote of 240-194 and moves on for Senate debate, which is expected to begin in several days.

Comment Re:Does Google give coade back (Score 4, Informative) 155

by farnsworth (#30017764) Attached to: How Google Uses Linux

Google is responsible for a tiny part of kernel development last I heard, unfortunately.

I don't know that much about google's private modifications, but the question of "what to give back" does not always have a clear default answer. I've modified lots of OSS in the past and not given it back, simply because my best guess was that I am the only person who will ever want feature x. There's no point in cluttering up mailing lists or documentation with something extremely esoteric. It's not because I'm lazy or selfish or greedy -- sometimes the right answer is to just keep things to yourself. (Of course, there are times when I've modified something hackishly, and had been too lazy or embarrassed to send it back upstream :)

Perhaps google answers this question in a different way than others would, but that doesn't necessarily conflict with "the spirit of OSS", whatever that might be.

Comment Re:The Good Old Days... (Score 1) 63

by Ecsa0014 (#30017740) Attached to: Sony Demos Natal-Like Control System
I think the argument is very relavent. Yeah, gimmicky games have existed for every system but now everybody wants to design systems around gimmicky ideas. I remeber being totally immersed in many games without the need for fancy peripherals, I didn't need them because the games were fun. I had a Wii for a year before I sold it because the controls became very annoying and most of the games that were released were crap, Even the fun games were hampered by the controls. From what I 've seen of the Natal promos and videos, it just doesn't look very appealing. Yeah, the ideas seem pretty cool but I can see the controls growing old pretty quickly.

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