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cafebabe writes:

Wired reports that:

At the Black Hat conference in Las Vegas next month Ragan and Salazar plan to reveal how they built a botnet using only free trials and freemium accounts on online application-hosting services--the kind coders use for development and testing to avoid having to buy their own servers and storage. The hacker duo used an automated process to generate unique email addresses and sign up for those free accounts en masse, assembling a cloud-based botnet of around a thousand computers.

That online zombie horde was capable of launching coordinated cyberattacks, cracking passwords, or mining hundreds of dollars a day worth of cryptocurrency. And by assembling that botnet from cloud accounts rather than hijacked computers, Ragan and Salazar believe their creation may have even been legal.

"We essentially built a supercomputer for free," says Ragan, who along with Salazar works as a researcher for the security consultancy Bishop Fox. "We're definitely going to see more malicious activity coming out of these services."

[UPDATE: Also submitted by: Common Joe]

Justin Case writes:

A Southwest Airlines gate agent did not care for a passenger's tweet, so she had him removed from the plane until he deleted the tweet.

Duff Watson's ticket was marked for priority boarding. But Watson said the agent wouldn't let his children board with him, forcing them all to wait. Watson tweeted "Something to the effect of, 'Wow, rudest agent in Denver. Kimberly S, gate C39, not happy @SWA,'" he said.

The agent allegedly told Watson that she felt her safety was threatened. I hope she feels safer now. Perhaps the arbitrary bully powers of the TSA have infected airline employees too.

martyb writes:

I'm looking for suggestions for a new keyboard for my PC.

Background: Over the years, I've used Teletype Model 38, DEC VT100, IBM Model M, and at least 20 other keyboards that came with whatever machine I was working with at the time.

My current, membrane, keyboard was inexpensive but after a couple years is already starting to occasionally drp out key presses and at other times rrrepeat them.

It would need to work with my current, IBM compatible, computer so a USB or wireless connection is necessary. A plus would be the ability in the future to use it with a tablet or mobile phone.

So, I'm looking for a new keyboard. I liked the Model M as there was no question when a key was pressed, but I'd prefer something quieter, and most importantly, with a much lighter touch. I am not interested in fancy lights or extra gaming keys, just a good, reasonably-priced keyboard.

I've read reports that Cherry and Razer have come out with mechanical switch keyboards but have not had an opportunity to try any of them. So, what say you fellow Soylents? Which keyboard(s) have you used and would recommend? (Ones to avoid would be welcome, too.)

gewg_ writes:

El Reg reports

Security outlet VUPEN has revealed it held onto a critical Internet Explorer vulnerability for three years before disclosing it at the March Pwn2Own hacker competition. The company wrote in a disclosure last week it discovered the vulnerability (CVE-2014-2777) on 12 February 2011 which was patched by Microsoft on 17 June (MS14-035).

The flaw affected Internet Explorer browsers eight through eleven and allowed remote attackers to bypass the protected mode sandbox.

"The vulnerability is caused due to an invalid handling of a sequence of actions aimed to save a file when calling 'ShowSaveFileDialog()', which could be exploited by a sandboxed process to write files to arbitrary locations on the system and bypass IE Protected Mode sandbox," the company wrote.

VUPEN collected US$300,000 for vulnerabilities disclosed at Pwn2Own affecting Adobe Reader, Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox, and Adobe Flash.

lhsi writes:

From the University of Sydney:

A new home-grown instrument based on bundles of optical fibres is giving Australian astronomers the first 'Google street view' of the cosmos - incredibly detailed views of huge numbers of galaxies.

Developed by researchers at the University of Sydney and the Australian Astronomical Observatory, the optical-fibre bundles can sample the light from up to 60 parts of a galaxy, for a dozen galaxies at a time.

By analysing the light's spectrum astronomers can learn how gas and stars move within each galaxy, where the young stars are forming and where the old stars live. This will allow them to better understand how galaxies change over time and what drives that change.

"It's a giant step," said Dr James Allen of the ARC Centre of Excellence for All-sky Astrophysics (CAASTRO) at the University of Sydney.

"Before, we could study one galaxy at a time in detail, or lots of galaxies at once but in much less detail. Now we have both the numbers and the detail."

The Australian team is now a year or two ahead of its international competition in this field. In just 64 nights it has gathered data on 1000 galaxies, twice as many as the previous largest project, and over the next two years it will study another 2000.

frojack writes:

In an article that acquired well over 300 replies on the normally-subdued Ars Technica comment board, it was reported that the Zipper Merge is the safest and fastest way for two lanes of traffic to merge.

The Zipper Merge is the polite name for those "rude" drivers that cruise to the head of the soon-to-be-closed lane and then merge with polite drivers at the last minute, cutting off and "delaying" all the polite drivers who moved to the remaining lane as soon they see the lane reduction signs.

Minnesota, and Washington state have found after extensive study, that having drivers filling both lanes and taking turns merging right at the point of closure was more efficient and safer than any other method of handling a lane closure.

Both states now officially endorse this method, but have a lot of driver re-education to do.

Washington state has a ways to go to catch up to Minnesota's efforts [PDF], however. In particular, the Minnesota Department of Transportation has added sensors to key roads; when they recognize pile-ups and congestions, electronic signs turn on and tell drivers to fill both lanes and merge at a later point.

MnDot has also provided a YouTube video to show how it should be done.

gewg_ writes:

Glyn Moody reports

Back in March, we reported on an interesting case where a UK court ruled that information stored electronically is not property. Now senior judges in New Zealand have agreed (found via @superglaze), as the Lexology site explains:

Jonathan Dixon, the Queenstown bouncer who accessed CCTV footage of the England Rugby Captain in a bar during the 2011 Rugby World Cup, appealed his conviction for dishonestly obtaining property on the basis that the digital data did not come under the definition of 'property' in the Crimes Act. The New Zealand Court of Appeal yesterday agreed (but substituted his conviction with one of dishonestly obtaining a benefit).

Suzy Q writes:

Dutch movie director Martin Koolhoven sent out an unusual request on Twitter a few days ago.

While many filmmakers fear The Pirate Bay, Koolhoven asked his followers to upload a copy of his 1999 film "Suzy Q" to the site.

The filmmaker had become fed up with the fact that copyright issues made his work completely unavailable through legal channels. "Can someone just upload Suzy Q to The Pirate Bay?" Koolhoven asked. To his surprise, pirates were quick to deliver.

gewg_ writes:

El Reg reports:

Reported in The Lancet, the study [on paracetamol also known as acetaminophen] funded by the National Health and Medical Research Council of Australia and pharmaceutical company GlaxoSmithKline Australia ran for over three years and involved "a multicentre, double-dummy, randomised, placebo controlled trial across 235 primary care centres in Sydney."

The study saw some patients given regular doses paracetamol, others told to take the drug when in pain and a third group handed placebos. Those given paracetamol, in either mode, reported no less pain than those taking placebos. Nor did sugar-pill-poppers recover from their ailments more slowly.

The authors therefore "question the universal endorsement of paracetamol in this patient group."

In this interview the study's leader Professor Chris Maher even questions whether Paracetamol can be considered a pain-killer.

"The jury is out" on whether the drug lessens pain, Professor Maher says about two minutes into the interview.

So, what does work? Don't just lay there; for starters, get up and MOVE AROUND.

An Anonymous Coward writes:

An Arizona minister mistook a photoshopped parody of a 1965 suntan lotion ad for a real ad promoting birth control, then used it as the basis for a controversial sermon about how "the birth control movement" is destroying the US. The ad featured wholesome Disney star Annette Funicello who, ironically, was actually pregnant (and married) when she appeared in the original ad. On the one-year anniversary of her death, the minister's mistake resulted in an erroneous summation of his sermon appearing whenever you searched Google News for Annette Funicello, along with the headline "Childless women on birth control have destroyed the U.S."

ramloss writes:

Two or three weeks ago I saw this documentary and I found it quite interesting, not just for the technology angle (which admittedly is tenous) but also as an example of a geek's obsessive behaviour. So I would like to share it with SoylentNews:

Tim Jenison (famous for the amiga video toaster) spent years trying to re-create "The Music Lesson", a Vermeer painting. In the process he learned dutch, built a replica of Vermeer studio, learned how to make his own lens and paint, sought (and got) permission from the Queen of England to examine the original, and a lot of other crazy things to achive his goal.

While the result is underwhelming at best, it's quite a remarkable achievement for a non-painter, you can watch a review of the documentary here

Blackmoore writes:

The Intercept brings us Blacklisted : The Secret Government Rulebook for Labeling You a Terrorist

The "March 2013 Watchlisting Guidance," a 166-page document issued last year by the National Counterterrorism Center, spells out the government's secret rules for putting individuals on its main terrorist database, as well as the no fly list and the selectee list, which triggers enhanced screening at airports and border crossings. The new guidelines allow individuals to be designated as representatives of terror organizations without any evidence they are actually connected to such organizations, and it gives a single White House official the unilateral authority to place "entire categories" of people the government is tracking onto the no fly and selectee lists. It broadens the authority of government officials to "nominate" people to the watchlists based on what is vaguely described as "fragmentary information." It also allows for dead people to be watchlisted.

Over the years, the Obama and Bush Administrations have fiercely resisted disclosing the criteria for placing names on the databases though the guidelines are officially labeled as unclassified. In May, Attorney General Eric Holder even invoked the state secrets privilege to prevent watchlisting guidelines from being disclosed in litigation launched by an American who was on the no fly list. In an affidavit, Holder called them a "clear roadmap" to the government's terrorist-tracking apparatus, adding: "The Watchlisting Guidance, although unclassified, contains national security information that, if disclosed ... could cause significant harm to national security."

"Instead of a watchlist limited to actual, known terrorists, the government has built a vast system based on the unproven and flawed premise that it can predict if a person will commit a terrorist act in the future," says Hina Shamsi, the head of the ACLU's National Security Project. "On that dangerous theory, the government is secretly blacklisting people as suspected terrorists and giving them the impossible task of proving themselves innocent of a threat they haven’t carried out." Shamsi, who reviewed the document, added, "These criteria should never have been kept secret."

The fallout is personal too. There are severe consequences for people unfairly labeled a terrorist by the U.S. government, which shares its watchlist data with local law enforcement, foreign governments, and "private entities." Once the U.S. government secretly labels you a terrorist or terrorist suspect, other institutions tend to treat you as one. It can become difficult to get a job (or simply to stay out of jail). It can become burdensome or impossible to travel. And routine encounters with law enforcement can turn into ordeals.

In short; the Intercept is publishing the previously unavailable government guide for putting you, and another several million people onto a watchlist; that has a crippling effect on your ability to live and no means to remove yourself from the list or the suspicion that goes with it.

Sure I suspect most of you are going to say "Why does this matter to me? I'm not a terrorist." but it does. For a society to be "free" you need to have disclosure of the law; and you have to have due process. a lack of either and you are no longer a free citizen; rather you are just another suspect or worse.

I've seen the effect of this on people I know. Good people who happen to share a name with someone on the list; People who went and talked to Occupy Wall Steet protesters (and didn't stay to protest) who found themselves under the scrutiny of police. We shouldn't sit idly by and let this go on. How would you purpose to get the government back to arresting criminals, instead of just accepting that America is just one large prison system?

One or more Anonymous Cowards write in with two related stories:

Firstly, eight science fiction classics, including Dune and The Lord of the Rings, have earned a spot on a list of "100 Books to Read in a Lifetime" as chosen by the book editors at Amazon.

"Over many months, the team passionately debated and defended the books we wanted on this list," explains their editorial director, noting that the "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" by Douglas Adams was a near miss. Other books included were "A Wrinkle in Time" and "The Hunger Games", as well as at least six free public domain classic books.

But one reporter notes that the list also includes both children's classics like "Where the Wild Things Are" and "House at Pooh Corner", as well as Hunter S. Thompson's "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas" ("We were somewhere around Barstow on the edge of the desert when the drugs began to take hold...").

Secondly, a related story notes that the popular meme relating to the BBC's "100 Books" list is a giant hoax.

"The BBC believes you only read 6 of these books" reads the headline on countless Facebook posts, forum comments, and web pages. But it's a hoax, conflating a 2007 list from Britain's Guardian newspaper (which had simply asked their readers to name which books "they can't live without").

The readers selected The Lord of the Rings trilogy and books from the Harry Potter series - but one reporter notes that the entertaining list is skewed heavily toward British authors. Six of the 100 books were written by Charles Dickens and four by Jane Austen - while not a single book on the list was written by Mark Twain, Ernest Hemingway, or William Faulkner."

From these lists it does seem clear that The Lord of the Rings remains popular.

hoochiecoochieman writes:

A study by the Washington-based "American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy" gave the gold medal to Germany as the most energy-efficient major economy. In general, Europe takes the best positions.

Surprisingly (at least for me), China achieves a good position in the ranking.

Not so surprisingly, the USA rank poorly, reaching 13th in 16, while Australia gets a warning for its inflexion in energy policies.

Mexico takes a shameful last place.

lhsi writes:

Abstract at nature.com (Paywalled)

The conditions deep inside large planets, such as Jupiter, Uranus and other planets recently discovered outside our solar system, have been experimentally recreated. This allows researchers to re-create and accurately measure material properties that control how these planets evolve over time (information that is essential for understanding how these massive objects form).

Using the largest laser in the world, the National Ignition Facility at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, teams from the Laboratory, University of California, Berkeley and Princeton University squeezed samples to 50 million times Earth's atmospheric pressure, which is comparable to the pressures at the center of Jupiter and Saturn. Of the 192 lasers at NIF, the team used 176 with exquisitely shaped energy versus time to produce a pressure wave that compressed the material for a short period of time. The sample diamond is vaporized in less than 10 billionths of a second.

Though diamond is the least compressible material known, the researchers were able to compress it to an unprecedented density greater than lead at ambient conditions.

"The experimental techniques developed here provide a new capability to experimentally reproduce pressure-temperature conditions deep in planetary interiors," said Ray Smith, LLNL physicist and lead author of the paper. Such pressures have been reached before, but only with shock waves that also create high temperatures hundreds of thousands of degrees or more that are not realistic for planetary interiors. The technical challenge was keeping temperatures low enough to be relevant to planets. The problem is similar to moving a plow slowly enough to push sand forward without building it up in height. This was accomplished by carefully tuning the rate at which the laser intensity changes with time.

"This new ability to explore matter at atomic scale pressures, where extrapolations of earlier shock and static data become unreliable, provides new constraints for dense matter theories and planet evolution models," said Rip Collins, another Lawrence Livermore physicist on the team.