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AnonTechie writes:

Federal Communications Commission Chairman Tom Wheeler is going to have a fight on his hands if he tries to pre-empt state laws that limit the growth of municipal broadband networks.

Matthew Berry, chief of staff to Republican Commissioner Ajit Pai, argued today that the FCC has no authority to invalidate state laws governing local broadband networks. In a speech in front of the National Conference of State Legislatures, Berry endorsed states' rights when it comes to either banning municipal broadband networks or preventing their growth. He also argued that the current commission, with its Democratic majority, should not do something that future Republican-led commissions might disagree with.

[Section 706 of The Telecommunications Act] http://www.psc.state.fl.us/publications/telecomm/trilogy/universa/706.aspx

Hugh Pickens writes:

For decades, butter has been the most vilified nutrient in the American diet but Time Magazine's cover story says that new science reveals that fat isn’t what’s hurting our health (paywalled). According to Time, scientists were wrong to label saturated fats the enemy — that carbs, sugar and processed foods are mainly to blame for obesity, diabetes and other weight-related diseases, according to a growing body of research and that Americans should reconsider the role saturated fats play in our diets.

Some of the confusion comes from the decades-long war on trans fats, the artificially produced artery-clogging ingredient found in baked goods and desserts. Science has shown that trans fats are harmful because they increase risk of heart disease because they both raise level of bad cholesterol (LDL) and lower levels of good cholesterol (HDL). Last year, the Food and Drug Administration said it would require food makers to phase out trans fats. "I do agree butter, along with other saturated fats like poultry skin, coconut oil, full fat dairy and certain cuts of red meat, are no longer the enemy," says TODAY diet expert Joy Bauer. "Unfortunately when fat was vilified back in the 1970s, we replaced those fats with…you guessed it…refined carbohydrates. That’s why we’re in trouble now."

According to Dr. Fred Kummerow, the 99-year old pioneer of trans-fat research and one of the first scientists to assert a link between heart disease and processed foods, the saturated fat in butter, cheese and meats does not contribute to the clogging of arteries — and in fact is beneficial in moderate amounts in the context of a healthy diet. “What I really want is to see trans fats gone finally,” says Kummerow, “and for people to eat better and have a more accurate understanding of what really causes heart disease.”

c0lo writes:

RT reports China is quite serious in ending its own GMO programs amid public concerns on GM crops:

China’s Ministry of Agriculture has decided not to continue with a program which developed genetically-modified rice and corn. Some environmentalists say public concerns about GM crops played a key role in the decision.

On August 17, when these permits were up for renewal, the Ministry of Agriculture decided not to extend them. In 2009, the ministry's Biosafety Committee issued approval certificates to develop the two crops, rice and corn.

According to the South China Morning Post, state television commissioned tests on five packets of rice, which were picked at random, and found three contained genetically-modified rice. It is illegal to sell or commercially grow GM rice in mainland China. The safety certificates issued in 2009 only allowed the rice to be planted for research purposes, but never for sale on the open market.

The strain, which was found, was one of two developed by Dr. Zhang Oifa, who is a professor at the Huazhong Agricultural University. He said, "it was not impossible" for the seeds to be put on to the open market. "You can't say [the seeds] were leaked on purpose. It's possible the seed companies have taken away the seeds and reproduced them illegally," he said, as reported by the South China Morning Post.

The move comes after a (relatively) recent ban on the importation of GMO crops in China: as early as Nov 2013, China started to reject shipload of GMO corn from US with specific restrictions put in place later, affecting also livestock feed concentrates and even GMO lucerne hay.

gewg_ writes:

TorrentFreak reports:

New research reveals that BitTorrent swarms can be slowed down significantly by malicious peers. Depending on the number of seeders and the clients they use, download times can be increased by 1000%. The attacks are possible through an exploit of the BitTorrent protocol for which the researchers present a fix.

[...] In an article published in "Computers & Security", Adamsky and his colleagues reveal an exploit which allows attackers to get a higher download rate from seeders than other people.

In technical terms, the exploit misuses BitTorrent's choking mechanism of clients that use the "Allowed Fast" extension. Attackers can use this to keep a permanent connection with seeders, requesting the same pieces over and over.

AnonTechie writes:

PC World reports:

The U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) is developing a guide for testing third-party apps to ensure that they are secure and don’t introduce any vulnerabilities.

The government agency has prepared a draft of its recommendations, “Technical Considerations for Vetting 3rd Party Mobile Applications,” and is seeking industry feedback by Sept. 18. The aim is to help enterprises make full use of commercial mobile programs.

Would you like to contribute to the NIST effort?

Hugh Pickens writes:

Robert McMillan writes that when it comes to computers, the federal government has a nasty reputation for prizing ISO standards and regulatory checkboxes above working code but now Mikey Dickerson, the former Google engineer who flew into Washington a year ago to salvage the disastrous Healthcare.gov website, says that's changing and the feds want all the techies out there to know Dickerson wasn’t forced to do his amazing job in a suit and tie.

If you do take a job at the White House, you may want to bring your own snacks, expect to work at a desk, not a couch, and hold off on bringing your skateboard to work. Still, the feds are trying to do tech in a clueful fashion. The Obama administration has opened the door to open-source software and collaborative coding. And, hey, even the CIA is using Amazon’s web services.

In a White House video, Dickerson, the new head of the US Digital Service, says he is asked one question again and again by people curious about his new job. They “want to know if I’m wearing a suit to work every day,” In the video, there’s a shot of a staff meeting where President Obama gives Dickerson and his fellow tech “hot-shots” a shout out. “They’re starting to look official now, aren’t they? They’ve got suits and everything,” Obama quips, a nod to the black jacket and yellow tie Dickerson has worn to the meeting. Dickerson tells the president this isn’t the norm. “This is literally only because you’re here,” he replies.

lhsi writes:

British and American intelligence agents are undermining their colleagues - other agents attempting to hack the "dark web" - by finding and reporting flaws in Tor.

kaszz writes:

Scientific reports have increasingly linked the bacteria in your gut to health and maladies, often making exaggerated claims. Did you hear about the mice who were given fecal transplants from skinny humans and totally got skinny! Well, some of the more gut-busting results might not be as solid as they seem. Epidemiologist Bill Hanage offers five critical questions to ask when confronted by the latest microbiome research:

1) Can experiments detect differences that matter? (are they specific enough?)

2) Does the study show causation or just correlation?

3) What is the mechanism?

4) How much do experiments reflect reality?

5) Could anything else explain the results?

(disclaimer: Nature is owned by Macmillan Publishers Limited Company. )

UPDATE: Corrected Nature ownership.

AnonTechie writes:

Instead of trusting "identification documents" in the form of certificates, JOANA, the new software analysis tool, examines the source text (code) of a program. In this way, it detects leaks, via which secret information may get out or strangers may enter the system from outside. At the same time, JOANA ( http://pp.ipd.kit.edu/projects/joana/ ) reduces the number of false alarms to a minimum. The analysis tool developed by Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) has already proved to work successfully in realistic test scenarios. In a next step, an industrial case study is planned.

"Established software certificates certify the manufacturer to be trustworthy. With JOANA, we can also check the real behavior of a program," says Gregor Snelting, who developed the analysis tool with his research group at the Chair of Programming Paradigms of KIT. In his opinion, this is important, because most weaknesses result from unintended programming errors. The scientists currently focus on mobile applications for Android smartphones. In principle, however, they can test any program written in JAVA, C or C++. First, software companies are to test their products before commercialization. As experts are required to set up and operate JOANA, it is less suited for private users.

[Software Overview]: http://pp.ipd.kit.edu/uploads/folien/joana-overview.pdf [PDF]

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2014-08/kift-fss082114.php

present_arms writes:

The Register reports of a rogue antivirus blocking legit websites and instead displays a warning.

from TFA:

A rogue anti-virus program called Defru has taken to the browser to find a smarter way of infecting users, Microsoft researchers say.

The Defru malware blocks users from visiting certain websites and instead displays warnings about fake perceived threats while the correct intended web address was still displayed.

Most victims are based in Russia, with the US and Kazakhstan trailing behind, Microsoft researcher Daniel Chipiristeanu (@Chipiristeanu) said.

Rogue anti-virus programs have been devastated in recent years by the security industry's fightback. Chipiristeanu showed that infections from the top wares, including Winwebsec, Onescan and FakePAV had plummeted across all global regions since October last year.

Infections were most prolific in the Asia Pacific.

Hugh Pickens writes:

ZDNet reports that from supercomputers to stock markets to smartphones, Linux dominates most computing markets, but Linus Torvalds still wants Linux to rule on one place it doesn't: The desktop. "The challenge on the desktop is not a kernel problem. It's a whole infrastructure problem. I think we'll get there one day," said Torvalds at the LinuxCon Convention in Chicago. "Year of the Linux desktop?" asked Kroah-Hartman. "I'm not going there," replied Torvalds with a smile.

Torvalds also discussed the issue of kernel code bloat as Linux is now being run in small-form-factor embedded devices. "We've been bloating the kernel over the last 20 years, but hardware has grown faster," Torvalds said. Torvalds wants to push the envelope for the embedded market despite some challenges. He noted that some of the small-form-factor device vendors have their own operating system technologies in place already, and those vendors don't always make hardware readily available to Linux kernel developers.

The issue of Linux code maintainers was another hot-button topic addressed by Torvalds, who noted that some Linux kernel code has only a single maintainer and that can mean trouble when that maintainer wants to take time off. Torvalds said that a good setup that is now used by the x86 maintainers is to have multiple people maintaining the code. It's an approach that ARM Linux developers have recently embraced, as well. "When I used to do ARM merges, I wanted to shoot myself and take a few ARM developers with me," Torvalds said. "It's now much less painful and ARM developers are picking up the multiple maintainer approach."

martyb writes:

According to this article on c|net:

Two … users have now revealed functioning hard drives built inside Minecraft that can read and write data. The first, created by Reddit and Imgur user smellystring can store 1KB [sic] of data, while a second, larger unit created by The0JJ can store 4KB [sic] of data.

"One day we will build a full computer in Minecraft, then play Minecraft on it. then the universe will crash," writes Imgur user mkat10z. Turns out, someone has already done that, creating a 2D platformer version of Minecraft that you play within Minecraft on a redstone computer.

UPDATE: It appears the referenced article was in error; the actual capacities should be in kilobits.

present_arms writes:

The Register has a nice review for the new Microsoft surface 3 fondleslab.

From TFA:

Review Microsoft’s Surface Pro 3.0 tablet sees its UK release on 28 August. But why is the Surface fondleslab called Surface?

Microsoft hijacked the name from one of its own existing products, the niche tabletop display now called PixelSense, but a remark by vice president Panos Panay at the October 2012 launch of the first Surface tablet shows why the team liked the name.

“We talk about it as a stage for Windows 8,” he said. “To work with the hardware and software teams together, to pull out everything that Windows is bringing to the surface of Surface.”

In other words, Surface was designed to show off Windows 8, which back then meant TIFKAM (The Interface Formerly Known As Metro), Windows Store apps, and multi-tasking with a split screen.

“The 10.6-inch screen is the perfect expression of Windows,” said Panay.

Customers did not buy it though: neither Surface RT, which was the subject of a $900m write-down in July 2013, nor Windows 8 in general. At least not if they could help it. Look for a business laptop today, and “Windows 7 preloaded” is the constant refrain. Further, the dismal selection of apps in the Windows Store means that even those who do have Windows 8 tend to use it in desktop mode most of the time.

Fast-forward to May 2014 and the press event for Surface Pro 3.0. “This is the tablet that can replace your laptop,” says Panay, explaining that the larger 12-inch screen is necessary for a device on which you can do all your work. There is a new focus on desktop applications. Whereas the competitive target of the original Surface was Apple’s iPad, Surface 3 is aimed at the MacBook Air.

Seems to me a nice, if expensive, machine; I just wonder how fast I could get Linux installed on it .

AnonTechie writes:

With enough technical savvy, simply touching a laptop can suffice to extract the cryptographic keys used to secure data stored on it.

The trick is based on the fact that the “ground” electrical potential in many computers fluctuates according to the computation that is being performed by its processor—including the computations that take place when cryptographic software operates to decrypt data using a secret key.

Measuring the electrical potential leaked to your skin when you touch the metal chassis of such laptops, and analyzing that signal using sophisticated software, can be enough to determine the keys stored within, says Eran Tromer, a computer security expert at Tel Aviv University.

http://www.technologyreview.com/news/530251/how-to-break-cryptography-with-your-bare-hands/

[Paper] http://www.cs.tau.ac.il/~tromer/handsoff/

migz writes:

Stuff.co.nz reports

Russian space officials have confirmed traces of plankton and other micro-organisms were found living on the exterior of the International Space Station (ISS), and it appears they've been living there for years.

This was also reported by c|net and ITAR-TASS.

How does this affect your views on finding life of some sort elsewhere in the universe?