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Via exec on IRC, runaway1956 submitted a link to this story:

Techdirt is reporting that, once again, the Brussels attacks were an intelligence community failure and not an encryption problem:

After the Paris attacks late last year, we noted that it was clear that they were evidence of an intelligence community failure, rather than an "encryption" problem -- which kind of explained why the intelligence community quickly tried to blame encryption. But, as we noted, most of the attackers were already known to the intelligence community and law enforcement -- and there's still little evidence that they used any encryption.

It's looking like the Brussels attacks are showing the same pattern. First, there were reports that Belgian law enforcement was well aware of the attackers and their connections.

In Brussels, one of two brothers who took part in Tuesday's attacks on Zaventem airport and a subway train, which killed 31 people and injured hundreds more, had already been suspected of helping the Paris attackers, the federal prosecutors' office said.

And another report noted that one of the brothers had been deported from Turkey a few months ago, and that Turkish officials had warned Belgium about his ties to terrorist groups.

Meanwhile, a more recent report says that US intelligence agencies were even more aware of the attackers:

[...] NBC News quoted U.S. officials who said that Khalid and Ibrahim El Bakraoui were known to U.S. counterterrorism authorities before Tuesday morning, when the pair and a third man detonated theor[sic] bombs at the airport and a train station.

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Phoenix666 writes:

A South Carolina high school teacher has sued (PDF) the school district that employed her after she was pushed to resign when a student grabbed racy pictures off her smartphone.

Leigh Anne Arthur resigned from her job earlier last month when she was told she would face disciplinary proceedings because a student grabbed photos off her phone while she was on a routine hall patrol.

At the time, Arthur complained that she, rather than the student, was the one being punished. The student shared the racy pictures of Arthur with his friends as well. Arthur said the pictures were a Valentine's Day gift for her husband, and she forgot to erase them from her phone.

"He knows right from wrong," she said of the student in a TV interview shortly after the incident. "Where are you putting the moral of the student?"

The 16-year-old student was hit with felony charges the following week.

In Arthur's lawsuit, filed Friday, she described how she left her phone on her desk during a five-minute interval in between classes. Without her permission, the student opened her photo app, then took pictures of her pictures with his own phone and shared them via social media.

takyon: Many students signed a petition to rehire the teacher.

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MrPlow writes:

Submitted via IRC for takyon and edited by martyb:

Back in 2014, data from the Sony hack revealed that:

In a new court filing Google strikes back at the MPAA, who want to keep their lead counsel from testifying at a deposition. According to Google, the Hollywood group can't invoke its First Amendment privilege to keep its lobbying efforts secret in order to avoid scrutiny or embarrassment.

In 2014 leaked documents from the Sony hack revealed that the MPAA helped Mississippi Attorney General Jim Hood to revive SOPA-like censorship efforts in the United States.

In a retaliatory move Google sued the Attorney General, hoping to find out more about the secret plan. The company also demanded internal communication from the MPAA and its lawfirm Jenner & Block, as well as several movie studios.

[...] "There is something deeply troubling in the MPAA claiming the First Amendment privilege to shield its role in lobbying Attorney General Hood to threaten Google's First Amendment rights.

"The MPAA should not be permitted to spend years lobbying a public official to suppress the speech of a business rival and then turn around and hide behind the very rights it was trying to squelch," Google adds.

Source: https://torrentfreak.com/google-first-amendment-doesnt-protect-mpaas-secrets-160325/

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MrPlow writes:

Submitted via IRC for takyon

A France-based Usenet provider says that his service has been raided and shutdown by the police. The 5,000 user 'Newsoo' service appears to have been a labor of love for its owner, but all data is now in the hands of authorities after he was arrested. A long-standing complaint by anti-piracy outfit SACEM appears to have been the trigger.

[...] Usenet (newsgroups) is a server-based sharing system that usually requires a subscription to access. Users download files (binaries) directly from servers run by their Usenet provider and no peer-to-peer sharing takes place. This means that downloads are very secure, almost immune from snooping, and generally very fast.

Certain prominent cases aside, Usenet providers have largely avoided prosecution but for one company in France the show is now over. Following a complaint filed by anti-piracy outfit SACEM two years ago, France's largest independent Usenet provider Newsoo has just been shut down by the police.

Source: https://torrentfreak.com/police-raid-usenet-service-arrest-operator-seize-data-160325/

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Phoenix666 writes:

Discussion on the advantages of TCP vs UDP (and vice versa) has a history which is almost as long as the eternal Linux-vs-Windows debate. As I have long been a supporter of the point of view that both UDP and TCP have their own niches (see, for example, [NoBugs15]), here are my two cents on this subject.

Note for those who already know the basics of IP and TCP: please skip to the 'Closing the Gap: Improving TCP Interactivity' section, as you still may be able to find a thing or two of interest.

It's a primer, or a refresher, or a skip. We have all kinds here. Enjoy, or don't.

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takyon writes:

Former Secretary of State Colin Powell's chief of staff has come out in support of Edward Snowden:

"I try to stay up with Snowden," said Lawrence "Larry" Wilkerson. "God, has he revealed a lot," he laughed. A retired Army colonel who served as the chief of staff to Secretary of State Colin Powell in President George W. Bush's administration, Wilkerson has established himself as a prominent critic of U.S. foreign policy. He sat down with Salon for an extended interview, discussing a huge range of issues from the war in Syria to climate change, from ISIS to whistle-blower Edward Snowden, of whom Wilkerson spoke quite highly.

"I think Snowden has done a service," Wilkerson explained. "I wouldn't have had the courage, and maybe not even the intellectual capacity, to do it the way he did it." [...] Breaking with establishment political figures, Col. Wilkerson commended Snowden for his work and the way in which he carried it out. "There's a logic to what he has done that is impressive," Wilkerson told Salon. "He really has refrained from anything that was truly dangerous, with regard to our security — regardless of what people say." He has been circumspect about what he's released, how he's released it, who he's released it to,"

But has Colin Powell done a service?

Also at The Register .

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Phoenix666 writes:

University of Otago researchers studying chinook salmon have provided the first evidence that "cryptic female choice" (CFC) enhances fertilisation success and embryo survival.

Cryptic female choice involves females using physical or chemical mechanisms to control which male fertilises their eggs after mating, and is known to occur in a number of species.

In 2008, Department of Anatomy researchers Dr Patrice Rosengrave and Professor Neil Gemmell were the first to show that CFC occurred in salmon. When these fish spawn, eggs and sperm are shed simultaneously into the surrounding water with ovarian fluid [OF] being secreted with the eggs.

They demonstrated ovarian fluid helped or hindered sperm swiftness depending on the male it came from.

Now, after conducting a series of competitive and non-competitive fertilisation experiments, the pair and colleagues have provided the first evidence that CFC contributes to reproductive success.

Dr Rosengrave says they found that not only does a particular female's OF give a bigger boost to some male's sperm and not others, these speedier sperm have a significantly higher chance of winning the race to fertilise eggs and the resulting offspring have a better survival rate as embryos.

IOW, guys, go for the bigger ring.

Cryptic female choice enhances fertilization success and embryo survival in chinook salmon (DOI: 10.1098/rspb.2016.0001)

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Phoenix666 writes:

Humans have put yeast to work for thousands of years to make bread, beer, and wine. Wild strains of yeast are also found in the natural fermentations that are essential for chocolate and coffee production. But, as new genetic evidence reported in the Cell Press journal Current Biology on March 24 shows, the yeasts associated with coffee and cacao beans have had a rather unique history.

In comparison to the yeasts found in vineyards around the world, the new work shows that those associated with coffee and cacao beans show much greater diversity. The findings suggest that those differences may play an important role in the characteristics of chocolate and coffee from different parts of the world.

"Our study suggests a complex interplay between human activity and microbes involved in the production of coffee and chocolate," says Aimée Dudley of the Pacific Northwest Diabetes Research Institute in Seattle. "Humans have transported and cultivated the plants, but at least for one important species, their associated microbes have arisen from transport and mingling in events that are independent of the transport of the plants themselves."

Coffee and cacao trees originally grew in Ethiopia and the Amazon rainforest. They are now widely cultivated across the "bean belt" that surrounds the equator. After they are picked, both cacao and coffee beans are fermented for a period of days to break down the surrounding pulp. This microbe-driven process also has an important influence on the character and flavor of the beans.

There are five food groups: Milk Chocolate, dark chocolate, white chocolate, chocolate truffles, and coffee.

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takyon writes:

Hyperloop, the transportation technology associated with Elon Musk, could be coming to Europe instead of California:

The Hyperloop could easily become the next big thing after bullet trains. It's a tube-based transportation system, in which pressurized passenger pods are accelerated through reduced-pressure tubes, which enables them to develop speeds as high as 760 miles per hour.

[...] While resolving technical issues was just a matter of time, crossing the red-tape sea in the U.S. forced one of the companies competing to make the Hyperloop a reality — Hyperloop Transportation Technologies, or HTT — to consider building their futuristic transportation pod in Slovakia, at the center of Europe. Just a few weeks ago, HTT CEO Dirk Ahlborn announced that his company has reached an agreement with the Slovakian government. Their plan is to establish the Hyperloop transportation route from Vienna to Bratislava, Slovakia, and from Bratislava to Budapest, Hungary. It normally takes about eight hours to travel from Košice, Slovakia, to Vienna to Budapest. But it's only 43 minutes with the Hyperloop.

[...] In an interview with Vice, HTT Chief Operating Officer Bibop G. Gresta said the initial feasibility study showed that the Hyperloop pod could transport up to 10 million people a year [in California]. The biggest challenges, he said, are politics and regulation.

Previously: The Race to Create Elon Musk's Hyperloop Heats Up
Three Tracks Planned to Test 'Hyperloop' Transportation Idea
MIT Design Wins SpaceX Hyperloop Design Competition

Original Submission

takyon writes:

A museum has released a computer-generated image of a man derived from his 1,600-1,900-year-old skeleton:

A computer-generated image of a man who lived in Roman Britain more than 1,600 years ago has gone on display. The depiction of Leasowe Man, named after the Merseyside town where he was found in 1864, is on show at the Museum of Liverpool. It said the image "raises lots of questions... about his life". Curator Liz Stewart said they were unable to ascertain his hair and eye colours but it was "most likely" he had the tones shown in the picture. The image of "Merseyside's oldest skeleton" was created by researchers at Liverpool John Moores University's Face Lab, which conducts archaeological and forensic work.

Radiocarbon dating has previously found that the skeleton, now on display at the Natural History Museum in London, is between 1,600 and 1,900 years old.

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takyon writes:

The Wellcome Trust has recommended that scientists publish their research in free, open access journals, rather than "hybrid" publications it operates:

Expensive research journal subscriptions could be on the way out, if the Wellcome Trust has its way. The moneybags UK research foundation has published a report favoring free, so-called open access, journals over those that charge a fee for access. The report reviewed the activities of research institutions that received funding from the trust. It found that it is cheaper, and thus a better use of grants, to place papers in freely available journals.

Meanwhile, the trust feels it's not getting enough bang for its bucks from hybrid publications. These hybrids charge scientists a decent wedge of cash to publish their work, charge people for journal subscriptions, and offer access to individual articles for free. In other words, the foundation would rather scientists submit their work to open-access journals, which are cheaper than hybrids in terms of publication and subscription costs. "We find that hybrid open access continues to be significantly more expensive than fully open access journals, and that as a whole, the level of service provided by hybrid publishers is poor and is not delivering what we are paying for," the trust said.

Related: Wellcome Trust and COAF Open Access Spend, 2014-15

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takyon writes:

An extradited businessman has pleaded guilty to conspiring to hack US defense contractors and send export-controlled data to China:

A businessman from China pleaded guilty on Wednesday to conspiring to hack into the computer networks of major US defense contractors including Boeing Co, the US Department of Justice said in a statement. Su Bin, 50, faces up to five years in jail for allegedly conspiring with two other people in China to obtain sensitive military information and export it illegally. Su's attorney Robert Anello said in an email: "In resolving this matter Su Bin hopes to move on with his life."

According to US government court filings, Su began working in 2008 to target US companies. In 2010, he emailed a file to an unnamed individual in China which contained information about Boeing's C-17 military transport aircraft. Su also helped his co-conspirators decide which company employees to target, and translated documents from English to Chinese. Arrested in Canada in 2014, Su ultimately consented to US extradition, the Justice Department said. Canadian media reported in January that two Chinese soldiers conspired with Su to obtain blueprints for F-35s and other jets.

The F-35 design documents are a trap!

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An Anonymous Coward writes:

When cancer cells migrate from the primary tumor they have to squeeze through densely packed cells of the tumor and surrounding microenvironment. New research (DOI: 10.1126/science.aad7297) shows that the physical stress of migrating through tight spaces can result in the rupture of the nuclear envelope and damage to the cell's genome:

See also: Cells can do the twist, but sometimes their nuclei burst

Original Submission

Phoenix666 writes:

As Yves Meyer was getting ready to publish a detailed mathematical proof that he had spent months working on, he decided do a final search of the existing literature. In the reference list of one of the papers he had just peer-reviewed, he noticed what he describes as a "bizarre" paper published in 1959 by Andrew Paul Guinand. Upon further investigation, he was shocked to discover that Guinand had formulated the exact same proof to solve the same problem that Meyer had been working on, though the solution had remained deeply buried and completely forgotten.

Meyer, a Professor Emeritus at the École Normale Supérieure de Cachan, accordingly revised and published his paper [DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1600685113], which appeared just a few weeks ago in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. In his work, he proves that there is not just one, but many Poisson summation formulas, using a simpler solution than was previously known.

Meyer—who has spent his career making fundamental contributions to wavelet theory and number theory, and recently won the Gauss Prize—explains that at first he was somewhat embarrassed that someone else had made the same discovery many decades earlier. However, he also interprets the experience as an example of a more universal pattern: that all of human discovery builds on what comes before.

"Suddenly I understood what I have been steadily doing in my scientific life," Meyer told Phys.org. "I was transmitting a heritage. Today I can express my gratitude to Guinand, who was a great person, both as a human being and as a mathematician."

That's a tale to strike terror into the heart of every grad student...

Original Submission

MrPlow writes:

Submitted via IRC for Runaway1956

The future in home delivery is quickly approaching -- in fact, it's travelling at six kilometres per hour and has that milk you ordered 10 minutes ago. [...] Under a new company called Starship, the creators of Skype have begun testing an autonomous delivery robot capable of rolling to your house with whatever items you’ve ordered from local businesses.

[...] The robot has sensors that let it stop and avoid any pedestrians or other obstacles. It's also monitored by humans, who can take over if there are any problems, or activate a speaker to let thieves know they're being filmed. [...] Starship has already tested their creation in the U.K. and is now letting it drive around Washington D.C., with hopes it'll soon begin crawling around sidewalks everywhere.

Source: Self-driving robot might be future of home delivery

takyon: We reported on this Skype robot and similar services back in November.

Original Submission