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owl writes:

https://nand2mario.github.io/posts/2026/80386_barrel_shifter/

I'm currently building an 80386-compatible core in SystemVerilog, driven by the original Intel microcode extracted from real 386 silicon. Real mode is now operational in simulation, with more than 10,000 single-instruction test cases passing successfully, and work on protected-mode features is in progress. In the course of this work, corners of the 386 microcode and silicon have been examined in detail; this series documents the resulting findings.

In the previous post, we looked at multiplication and division -- iterative algorithms that process one bit per cycle. Shifts and rotates are a different story: the 386 has a dedicated barrel shifter that completes an arbitrary multi-bit shift in a single cycle. What's interesting is how the microcode makes one piece of hardware serve all shift and rotate variants -- and how the complex rotate-through-carry instructions are handled.

Original Submission

Arthur T Knackerbracket writes:

https://www.theregister.com/2026/02/09/taiwan_us_chip_production/

Taiwan's vice-premier has ruled out relocating 40 percent of the country's semiconductor production to the US, calling the Trump administration's goal "impossible."

In an interview broadcast on the CTS channel, vice premier Cheng Li-chiun said she made clear to US officials that Taiwan's semiconductor ecosystem cannot be moved and its most advanced technologies will remain domestic.

"When it comes to 40 or 50 percent of production capacity being moved to the United States... I have made it very clear to the US side that this is impossible," she said, according to The Straits Times.

Cheng led Taiwan's January's trade delegation to Washington, which secured reduced US tariffs on Taiwanese goods - from 20 percent to 15 percent - in exchange for increased investment into America's tech sector.

At the time, US commerce secretary Howard Lutnick told CNBC the deal aimed to relocate 40 percent of Taiwan's entire chip manufacturing and production capacity to America.

A Department of Commerce release cast the agreement as a "massive reshoring of America's semiconductor sector."

Taiwan, which produces more than 60 percent of global semiconductors and roughly 90 percent of the world's most advanced chips, insists it gained this leadership position by investing in the tech when other countries didn't.

Former Intel chief Pat Gelsinger supports this view, publicly stating a couple of years ago that countries like Korea, Taiwan, and China put in place long-term industrial policies and investment in chipmaking, while the US and European nations failed to do the same.

Cheng reiterated this in her interview, saying that "an industrial ecosystem built up over decades cannot be relocated."

Taiwan views its semiconductor dominance as strategic defense against Chinese aggression. Beijing claims Taiwan as its territory and threatens reunification by force if necessary. Even Lutnick acknowledged this "silicon shield" dynamic last year, noting China's open ambitions:

"We need their silicon, the chips so badly that we'll shield them, we'll protect them."

TSMC considered relocating its chip fabs in 2024 due to China threats but decided against the idea given the difficulties.

Any Chinese invasion would devastate the global tech sector, as The Register pointed out recently. Most of Nvidia's GPUs are made in Taiwan, as are AMD's processors and Qualcomm's smartphone chips. The supply of these would be cut off by any invasion, and there is no other source these companies can easily turn to.

Original Submission

upstart writes:

Controversial 2025 study "represents the encroachment of pseudoscience into the heart of biological research":

Last year, a team of scientists presented evidence that spruce trees in Italy's Dolomite mountains synchronized their bioelectrical activity in anticipation of a partial solar eclipse—a potentially exciting new insight into the complexities of plant communication. The findings naturally generated media interest and even inspired a documentary. But the claims drew sharp criticism from other researchers in the field, with some questioning whether the paper should even have been published. Those initial misgivings are outlined in more detail in a new critique published in the journal Trends in Plant Science.

For the original paper, Alessandro Chiolerio, a physicist at the Italian Institute of Technology, collaborated with plant ecologist Monica Gagliano of Southern Cross University and several others conducting field work in the Costa Bocche forest in the Dolomites. They essentially created an EKG for trees, attaching electrodes to three spruce trees (ranging in age from 20 to 70 years) and five tree stumps in the forest.

Those sensors recorded a marked increase in bioelectrical activity during a partial solar eclipse on October 22, 2022. The activity peaked mid-eclipse and faded away in its aftermath. Chiolerio et al. interpreted this spike in activity as a coordinated response among the trees to the darkened conditions brought on by the eclipse. And older trees' electrical activity spiked earlier and more strongly than the younger trees, which Chiolerio et al. felt was suggestive of trees developing response mechanisms—a kind of memory captured in associated gravitational effects. Older trees might even transmit this knowledge to younger trees, the authors suggested, based on the detection of bioelectrical waves traveling between the trees.

Soon, other plant scientists weighed in, expressing strong skepticism and citing the study's small sample size and large number of variables, among other concerns. Justine Karst, a forest ecologist at the University of Alberta in Canada, unfavorably compared Chiolerio et al.'s findings to a 2019 study claiming evidence for the controversial "wood-wide web" concept, in which trees communicate and share resources via underground networks of mycorrhizal fungi. Karst co-authored a 2023 study demonstrating insufficient evidence for the wood-wide-web.

Freeman writes:

https://arstechnica.com/google/2026/02/google-recovers-deleted-nest-video-in-high-profile-abduction-case/

Like most cloud-enabled home security cameras, Google's Nest products don't provide long-term storage unless you pay a monthly fee. That video may not vanish into the digital aether right on time, though. Investigators involved with the high-profile abduction of Nancy Guthrie have released video from Guthrie's Nest doorbell camera—video that was believed to have been deleted because Guthrie wasn't paying for the service.
[...]
If you don't pay anything, Google only saves three hours of event history. After that, the videos are deleted, at least as far as the user is concerned.
[...]
Expired videos are no longer available to the user, and Google won't restore them even if you upgrade to a premium account later. However, that doesn't mean the data is truly gone. Nancy Guthrie was abducted from her home in the early hours of February 1, and at first, investigators said there was no video of the crime because the doorbell camera was not on a paid account. Yet, video showing a masked individual fiddling with the camera was published on February 10.
[...]
In statements made by investigators, the video was apparently "recovered from residual data located in backend systems." It's unclear how long such data is retained or how easy it is for Google to access it. Some reports claim that it took several days for Google to recover the data.
[...]
There is a temptation to ascribe some malicious intent to Google's video storage setup. After all, this video expired after three hours, but here it is nine days later. That feels a bit suspicious on the surface, particularly for a company that is so focused on training AI models that feed on video.
[...]
every event recorded by the camera is going to Google's servers, and it's probably recoverable long past the deletion timeline stipulated in the company's policy.
[...]
there are still more traditional "DVR" security cameras, which record footage to dedicated local storage. Many NAS boxes also have support for storing and managing video from select security cameras. If you're sending video to the cloud, you can't expect it will be totally gone even if you no longer have access to it.

Original Submission

Arthur T Knackerbracket writes:

Elon Musk says launch windows and other logistics are behind the shift in strategy:

Elon Musk says SpaceX has shifted its near-term priorities from Mars settlement plans to building what he called a "self-growing city on the Moon," arguing the lunar target is faster and more achievable. In a post on X, Musk claims the company could complete this in less than 10 years, while doing the same on Mars would take over 20 years.

This marks a major shift for the aerospace company, as Musk points out that the logistics of first completing a proof of concept on the moon are easier with respect to launch windows and proximity to Earth. The SpaceX founder is notorious for promising optimistic timelines that never come to pass, and said in 2017 that a base on Mars would be ready for its first settlers as early as 2024.

In subsequent replies to other posts Musk predicted "Mars will start in 5 or 6 years, so will be done parallel with the Moon, but the Moon will be the initial focus." He also said a manned Mars flight might happen in 2031.

Early last year Musk said in a post on X that SpaceX would be going "straight to Mars" and that "the Moon is a distraction." This was in response to Space industry analyst Peter Hague pointing out that among other considerations, lunar regolith, a material found on the surface of the moon, is about 45 percent oxygen. In 2023 NASA proved this oxygen could be extracted, which would yield enormous payload savings as opposed to shipping liquid oxygen between Earth and Mars.

NASA's Artemis missions, which SpaceX is a contractor for at certain stages, are planned to see humans back on the lunar surface by 2028. Artemis II, during which astronauts will circle the moon before returning to Earth, is set to launch in March of this year.

Original Submission

owl writes:

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2026/02/byte-magazine-artist-robert-tinney-who-illustrated-the-birth-of-pcs-dies-at-78/

On February 1, Robert Tinney, the illustrator whose airbrushed cover paintings defined the look and feel of pioneering computer magazine Byte for over a decade, died at age 78 in Baker, Louisiana, according to a memorial posted on his official website.

As the primary cover artist for Byte from 1975 to the late 1980s, Tinney became one of the first illustrators to give the abstract world of personal computing a coherent visual language, translating topics like artificial intelligence, networking, and programming into vivid, surrealist-influenced paintings that a generation of computer enthusiasts grew up with.

Original Submission

upstart writes:

Incident is at least the third time the exchange has been targeted by thieves:

Open source packages published on the npm and PyPI repositories were laced with code that stole wallet credentials from dYdX developers and backend systems and, in some cases, backdoored devices, researchers said.

"Every application using the compromised npm versions is at risk ...." the researchers, from security firm Socket, said Friday. "Direct impact includes complete wallet compromise and irreversible cryptocurrency theft. The attack scope includes all applications depending on the compromised versions and both developers testing with real credentials and production end-users."

Packages that were infected were:

*SPOILER* (click to show) *SPOILER* (click to hide)

npm (@dydxprotocol/v4-client-js):

• 3.4.1
• 1.22.1
• 1.15.2
• 1.0.31

PyPI (dydx-v4-client):

• 1.1.5post1

dYdX is a decentralized derivatives exchange that supports hundreds of markets for "perpetual trading," or the use of cryptocurrency to bet that the value of a derivative future will rise or fall. Socket said dYdX has processed over $1.5 trillion in trading volume over its lifetime, with an average trading volume of $200 million to $540 million and roughly $175 million in open interest. The exchange provides code libraries that allow third-party apps for trading bots, automated strategies, or backend services, all of which handle mnemonics or private keys for signing.

[...] The malicious code available on PyPI contained the same credential theft function, although it also implemented a remote access Trojan (RAT) that allowed the execution of new malware on infected systems. The backdoor received commands from dydx[.]priceoracle[.]site. The domain was registered on January 9, 17 days before the malicious package was uploaded to PyPI.

hubie writes:

Subtle changes in Sir Terry Pratchett's use of language in his books anticipated his dementia diagnosis by almost ten years, research has shown:

The study, from academics at Cardiff University, Loughborough University and the University of Oxford, used computer software to analyse the range of nouns and adjectives used in 33 of his best-selling Discworld novels.

The results show a significant decrease in the diversity of nouns and adjectives in his later works. This shift was particularly marked in the diversity of adjectives, which decreased below a defined threshold approximately ten years before Pratchett's formal diagnosis.

Sir Terry Pratchett died in 2015 at the age of 66. He had posterior cortical atrophy, a rare form of early-onset Alzheimer's disease that primarily affects visual processing.

Study co-author Dr Melody Pattison, based at Cardiff University's School of English, Communication and Philosophy, said: "Our analysis of Sir Terry Pratchett's novels suggests that subtle changes in linguistic patterns, such as decreased lexical diversity, may precede clinical diagnosis of dementia by a considerable margin. In particular we found the richness of descriptive language in his books gradually narrowed."

We would normally expect less lexical diversity as texts get longer, but even after controlling for text length our findings were still significant. This was not something a reader would necessarily notice, but rather a subtle, progressive change. --Dr Melody Pattison

[...] "Research indicates that memory problems may not be the first symptom of dementia. We wanted to explore whether language could be an early warning sign, and to do this, we used Sir Terry Pratchett's books, who himself suffered dementia.

"Our analysis found that Sir Terry's use of language did indeed change during his career. These results suggest that language may be one of the first signs of dementia, and Sir Terry's books reveal a potential new approach for early diagnosis."

Journal Reference: Brain Sci. 2026, 16(1), 94; https://doi.org/10.3390/brainsci16010094

Original Submission

Arthur T Knackerbracket writes:

https://www.techspot.com/news/111241-mit-scientists-build-terahertz-microscope-reveals-hidden-superconducting.html

A team of physicists at MIT has managed to do something long thought impossible: peer into the ultrafast, quantum-scale motion of superconducting electrons. Using a microscope built around pulses of terahertz light – radiation oscillating trillions of times per second – they've captured a kind of atomic dance that has remained hidden until now.

The implications of the breakthrough could ripple through multiple industries. A better understanding of how superconductivity behaves at quantum scales could accelerate the development of room-temperature superconductors, radically improving electrical grids, quantum computers, and magnetic levitation systems.

The underlying terahertz technology itself – capable of transmitting and detecting signals at unprecedented speeds – could shape the future of wireless communications, sensing devices, and ultrafast data transfer for next-generation electronics.

The development, described in Nature, centers on bismuth strontium calcium copper oxide (BSCCO), a copper-based superconductor known for carrying electricity without resistance at relatively high temperatures.

When hit with precisely tuned terahertz bursts, the electrons inside the material began to move collectively, vibrating in unison at the same frequencies as the light itself. MIT physicist Nuh Gedik calls this previously unseen motion "a new mode of superconducting electrons."

The feat was accomplished using a terahertz microscope capable of compressing radiation that typically stretches hundreds of microns long down to the tiny scale of a quantum material. Terahertz radiation sits between microwaves and infrared on the electromagnetic spectrum, an energy range considered a sweet spot for imaging because it's non-ionizing, penetrates deeply, and matches the natural oscillation rate of atoms and electrons.

Yet until now, it's been all but useless for imaging small structures because of a fundamental barrier called the diffraction limit – light can't be focused to a spot smaller than its own wavelength.

quietus writes:

... have you no sense of decency, sir?

(Attorney Joseph Welch, 1954 Army‑McCarthy hearings)

"The European Commission, in a comprehensive decade-long effort, has successfully pressured social media platforms to change their global content moderation rules, thereby directly infringing on Americans' online speech in the United States. Though often framed as combating so-called "hate speech" or "disinformation," the European Commission worked to censor true information and political speech about some of the most important policy debates in recent history—including the COVID-19 pandemic, mass migration, and transgender issues. After ten years, the European Commission has established sufficient control of global online speech to comprehensively suppress narratives that threaten the European Commission's power."

Thus opens a February 3 report [PDF] of the Committee on the Judiciary of the US House of Representatives.

The report is a long, long through-the-looking-glass argument against the European Union's Digital Services Act (DSA), specifically its Code of Practice on Disinformation.

That DSA, goes the argument -- with a long list of screenshots of heavily redacted e-mails, and the occasional Fox News article as source -- has been used to gang-pressure a whole bunch of election campaigns in European countries: France (2024), the Netherlands (2023 & 2025), Slovakia (2023), Moldova (2024), Germany, Ireland (2024 & 2025), and Romania. Romania's 2024 presidential election is a particularly nasty example, with the EU and France pressuring Telegram and TikTok to block content associated with conservative candidate Călin Georgescu, despite the absence of evidence supporting allegations of Russian interference used to justify those actions (says the report). [Paywalled]

What the report also -- inadvertently -- highlights is how the European Union (and Australia, Japan, South-Korea and Canada) and the United States are diverging on the treatment of social media.

Out of the EU's 27 member states, 15 of them have a partial or complete ban on smartphone usage in schools in place. Nine EU countries -- Spain, Greece, France, Italy, Finland, Germany, Denmark, Austria and Portugal -- are currently discussing a ban on social media usage under a certain age (mostly around 15, 16): a debate driven by concerns about addiction, mental health impact, and the spread of harmful content.

South Korea has implemented a school‑wide phone‑ban since 2024 and is actively discussing, but has not yet legislated, a social‑media age limit for minors. Japan is considering age‑restriction policies and has a government‑led working group, but there is currently no legal ban on smartphones in schools nor a statutory social‑media age limit. In Canada, most provinces have mandatory school-wide bans, but there is no age limit being discussed (yet), while Australia has no ban on smartphone usage, but is the first to have a federal law barring under-16s of having accounts on major social media platforms.

Get 'em while they're young, I guess.

Original Submission

fliptop writes:

Stellantis says it overestimated the EV transition and is shifting back to hybrids, V8s, and what customers actually want:

Stellantis took a €22.2 billion ($26.25 billion) write-down last year, tied largely to scaling back electric vehicle programs. But buried inside the numbers is a much bigger message: the company openly acknowledged it moved faster than customers were ready to follow. According to Stellantis and Reuters, the automaker is now rebuilding its strategy around real-world demand rather than aggressive electrification targets.

CEO Antonio Filosa was unusually direct in Stellantis's announcement, saying the company "over-estimated the pace of the energy transition" and allowed their pre-planned strategy to overpower what buyers actually want. The result was billions written off in canceled EV products, impaired electric platforms, and downsized battery operations. Keep in mind, Stellantis had once aimed for electric vehicles to make up 50% of U.S. sales and all European sales by 2030, despite EV adoption in America sitting at 7%.

That disconnect is now being corrected, with Stellantis shifting capital back toward hybrids and internal combustion models that align more closely with consumer wants. And it seems other automakers have the same idea in mind, with even Porsche rumored to abandon the all-electric 718. To add fuel to the fire, there are countless players in the EV segment nowadays, with Chinese automakers seeming to lead the pack. Pursuing a profitable full-electric approach has become more difficult than ever before.

Previously:

• Stellantis Drops Jeep, Chrysler Plug-in Hybrids Amid EV Sales Slowdown
• Chrysler to Go All-Electric by 2028, Starting with the Airflow in 2025

Original Submission

hubie writes:

Beginning in March, all accounts will have a 'teen-appropriate experience by default'

Discord announced on Monday that it's rolling out age verification on its platform globally starting next month, when it will automatically set all users' accounts to a "teen-appropriate" experience unless they demonstrate that they're adults.

"For most adults, age verification won't be required, as Discord's age inference model uses account information such as account tenure, device and activity data, and aggregated, high-level patterns across Discord communities. Discord does not use private messages or any message content in this process," Savannah Badalich, Discord's global head of product policy, tells The Verge.

Users who aren't verified as adults will not be able to access age-restricted servers and channels, won't be able to speak in Discord's livestream-like "stage" channels, and will see content filters for any content Discord detects as graphic or sensitive. They will also get warning prompts for friend requests from potentially unfamiliar users, and DMs from unfamiliar users will be automatically filtered into a separate inbox.
Related

Direct messages and servers that are not age-restricted will continue to function normally, but users won't be able to send messages or view content in an age-restricted server until they complete the age check process, even if it's a server they were part of before age verification rolled out. Badalich says those servers will be "obfuscated" with a black screen until the user verifies they're an adult. Users also won't be able to join any new age-restricted servers without verifying their age.

[...] If Discord's age inference model can't determine a user's age, a government ID might still be required for age verification in its global rollout. According to Discord, to remove the new "teen-by-default" changes and limitations, "users can choose to use facial age estimation or submit a form of identification to [Discord's] vendor partners, with more options coming in the future."

The first option uses AI to analyze a user's video selfie, which Discord says never leaves the user's device. If the age group estimate (teen or adult) from the selfie is incorrect, users can appeal it or verify with a photo of an identity document instead. That document will be verified by a third party vendor, but Discord says the images of those documents "are deleted quickly — in most cases, immediately after age confirmation."

Badalich also says after the October data breach, Discord "immediately stopped doing any sort of age verification flows with that vendor" and is now using a different third-party vendor. She adds, "We're not doing biometric scanning [or] facial recognition. We're doing facial estimation. The ID is immediately deleted. We do not keep any information around like your name, the city that you live in, if you used a birth certificate or something else, any of that information."

[...] Even so, there's still a risk that some users will leave Discord as a result of the age verification rollout. "We do expect that there will be some sort of hit there, and we are incorporating that into what our planning looks like," Badalich says. "We'll find other ways to bring users back."

Original Submission

An Anonymous Coward writes:

Or it might just be destroyed by the Sun. It's a tough call:

It's been a while since we've had a Great Comet in the sky, something bright and visible for many. Currently, no object appears to fit the bill for 2026, but a couple of comets have a chance to become bright enough to be visible to the naked eye this April. In fact, a newly discovered Kreutz sungrazer has a very good chance of doing that.

The object is known as C/2026 A1 (MAPS), discovered extremely recently on January 20 by a group of French amateur astronomers using the AMACS1 Observatory in the Atacama Desert, Chile. It has been traced back to the Kreutz comet group, a group that has some of the brightest comets ever seen, like the Great Comet of 1843.

Like other members of this group, it comes from below the plane of the Solar System. It will have its perihelion, its closest approach to the Sun, on April 4. At perihelion, the comet will be just 810,000 kilometers (about 500,000 miles) from our star. In comparison, interstellar comet 3I/ATLAS's perihelion in October 2025 saw it fly around 200 million kilometers (124 million miles) from the Sun.

Sungrazing comets can become very bright for quite a while, or very bright for a very short time, or just get ripped apart. We'll have to wait and see. It is already a record-breaker, however. No inbound Kreutz comet has ever been spotted so far from the Sun with such a long lead-in time (11.5 weeks) before reaching perihelion.

"It's moving on an orbit typical of Kreutz sungrazing comets, and already holds one record. At the time of its discovery, comet MAPS was farther from the Sun than any previous newly discovered sungrazer," Jonti Horner wrote in The Conversation. "That suggests it might be a larger-than-usual fragment—perhaps."

upstart writes:

After years of bolting AI onto everything, Redmond remembers admins exist:

There is good news for administrators: Microsoft has delivered on its promise to build Sysmon functionality into Windows.

The functionality arrived in the Dev and Beta Windows Insider channels this week in builds 26300.7733 and 26220.7752, respectively. It allows administrators to capture system events via custom configuration files, filter for specific events, and write them to the standard Windows event log for pickup by third-party applications, including security tools.

Sysmon, part of the Sysinternals toolset, has long been useful for monitoring Windows' internals. Mark Russinovich, Microsoft technical fellow and co-founder of Winternals, from whence Sysinternals (and Sysmon) sprang, said: "It helps in detecting credential theft, uncovering stealthy lateral movement, and powering forensic investigations.

"Its granular diagnostic data feeds security information and event management (SIEM) pipelines and enables defenders to spot advanced attacks."

But deployment has been painful for administrators, managing potentially thousands of endpoints across an enterprise that need to be kept. Russinovich noted "a lack of official customer support for Sysmon in production environments."

Having it built in (though disabled by default) is therefore welcome, a respite from Microsoft's relentless AI integrations across its portfolio.

Enabling it requires some work with PowerShell, which shouldn't trouble Sysmon-savvy users. Microsoft notes that any existing Sysmon installation must be uninstalled first before the built-in version can be enabled.

After a month of patches that Microsoft would rather forget, Sysmon's arrival is a genuinely positive update.

Original Submission

When reading my local newspaper online this morning, I noticed for the first time a small message, lower-left of the window, "Opt-Out Signal Honored". A little quick searching turned up GPC, Global Privacy Control https://globalprivacycontrol.org/

The GPC signal is intended to communicate a Do Not Sell or Share request under the California Consumer Privacy Act, and similar state privacy laws that allow users to opt out of data sales or the use of their data for cross-context targeted advertising. Under the GDPR, the intent of the GPC signal is to convey a general request that data controllers limit the sale or sharing of the user's personal data to other data controllers (GDPR Articles 7 & 21). The GPC may also invoke other compatible rights in other jurisdictions.

A little more digging shows that SN covered this in late 2020 (five+ years ago), https://soylentnews.org/article.pl?sid=20/10/08/0119236 but at that time it was in the FSF Privacy Badger--which I was already using back then.

So my first thought is that all of a sudden my state (not California) has turned on a similar rule. But then, my partner's Win11 PC (no Privacy Badger) gave the same message on a consumer company catalog page (from yet a third state)--so maybe the message is coming from somewhere else? We do both use Firefox, but I'm on ESR (for Win7) and they are on the main track.

Why did the message start to appear today? Does GPC actually work? Any relation to the European GDPR?

Original Submission