SoylentNews

Phoenix666 writes:

Facebook Inc. is working to combat a decline in people sharing original, personal content, the fuel that helps power the money machine at the heart of its social network, according to people familiar with the matter.

Overall sharing has remained "strong," according to Facebook. However, people have been less willing to post updates about their lives as their lists of friends grow, the people said.

Instead, Facebook's 1.6 billion users are posting more news and information from other websites. As Facebook ages, users may have more than a decade's worth of acquaintances added as friends. People may not always feel comfortable checking into a local bar or sharing an anecdote from their lives, knowing these updates may not be relevant to all their connections.

[...] Original sharing of personal stories -- rather than posts about public information like news articles -- dropped 21 percent year over year as of mid-2015, The Information, a tech news site, reported Wednesday. Facebook said in a statement that "the overall level of sharing has remained not only strong, but similar to levels in prior years."

Maybe it's not how much you share, but how you share and in what setting.

Original Submission

takyon writes:

NASA's NEOWISE mission is continuing to find merciless space rocks:

NASA's Near-Earth Object Wide-field Survey Explorer (NEOWISE) mission has released its second year of survey data. The spacecraft has now characterized a total of 439 NEOs since the mission was re-started in December 2013. Of these, 72 were new discoveries.

[...] Since beginning its survey in December 2013, NEOWISE has measured more than 19,000 asteroids and comets at infrared wavelengths. More than 5.1 million infrared images of the sky were collected in the last year. A new movie, based on the data collected, depicts asteroids and comets observed so far by NEOWISE.

"By studying the distribution of lighter- and darker-colored material, NEOWISE data give us a better understanding of the origins of the NEOs, originating from either different parts of the main asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter or the icier comet populations," said James Bauer, the mission's deputy principal investigator at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.

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takyon writes:

Uber is facing one less lawsuit against it. Two district attorneys sued the ride-sharing company over statements it made about the safety of its service as well as fees charged to passengers traveling to or from the airport:

Uber Technologies Inc agreed to a $25 million settlement to end a civil lawsuit in California that accused the ride-sharing company of misleading customers about the strength of its background checks on drivers, prosecutors in Los Angeles and San Francisco said on Thursday. Uber must pay $10 million within 60 days, and the remaining $15 million will be waived if Uber complies with the terms of the agreement for two years, the San Francisco and Los Angeles County district attorneys said in statements.

[...] The case was filed in December 2014 by the two district attorneys, who alleged that Uber misled its customers about the strength of its background checks on drivers. The civil complaint also contended that Uber drivers work at airports without obtaining authorization, and in the case of San Francisco, charged a $4 extra fee to passengers traveling there, without paying anything to the airport.

Airport surcharges aren't necessarily going away, but Uber will only operate at California airports at which it has explicit permission to do so. In their arguments against Uber's "gold standard" safety advertising, the district attorneys noted that Uber does not use fingerprint checks as traditional cab companies do, and that Uber had failed to prevent 25 people with prior criminal convictions from becoming drivers.

The $10 million payment will be split evenly between the cities of San Francisco and Los Angeles.

Previously: Uber: Cartel or Company? Court Rulings Diverge

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fleg writes:

The Guardian is reporting that the hack on the San Bernardino shooter's iPhone 5C will not work on newer iPhones.

The FBI director confirmed that the hack works on the iPhone 5C and older Apple smartphones, but not newer models with a fingerprint sensor. This is probably because older phones lack the so-called secure enclave, which protects passcodes, security keys and handles the security of the phone's encryption system.

Comey confirmed that the FBI bought a tool from a third party, negating the need to continue its legal action against Apple. But the FBI has yet to disclose publicly how the hack that unlocked the iPhone 5C works, despite informing senators about it.

Comey said: "We're having discussions within government about it ... if we tell Apple they're going to fix it and we're back to where we started."

The FBI director ended by reassuring everyone...

Comey wouldn't comment on who the company or persons the hack was purchased from. He would only say that "their motivations align with ours" and that the FBI and the hack provider were "very good at keeping secrets".

Original Submission

We had submissions from several Soylentils reguarding the "Panama Papers" document leak. We lead off with some background on what the leak is, followed by two stories about Iceland's Prime Minister resigning and being replaced, and conclude with a perspective from a former British Ambasador.

2.6 Terabyte Leak of Offshore Banking Industry Data

ollonk writes:

Germany's Süddeutsche Zeitung (SZ) has released the biggest leak in journalistic history, posting 11.5 million documents from a Panamanian law firm online and providing "rare insights into a world that can only exist in the shadows."

https://panamapapers.icij.org/
http://panamapapers.sueddeutsche.de/en/
http://panamapapers.sueddeutsche.de/articles/56febff0a1bb8d3c3495adf4/

The Panama Papers leak is a news leak of confidential documents from the Panamanian law firm Mossack Fonseca that relate to the offshore wealth of world leaders and other politically exposed persons and politicians, and prominent individuals in business, finance, and sports governance. Mossack Fonseca allegedly helped world leaders and other high profiles evade taxes by creating oftentimes illegal tax havens.

Panama Papers Claim a Victim: Iceland's Prime Minister Resigns

takyon writes:

Iceland's Prime Minister will resign following the discovery of offshore bank accounts linked to him, found in the leaked Panama Papers:

Icelandic Prime Minister Sigmundur David Gunnlaugsson resigned Tuesday, days after a massive data leak known as the Panama Papers linked him to secret offshore bank accounts. With Gunnlaugsson on his way out, his deputy in Iceland's Progressive Party, Sigurdur Ingi Johannsson, will lead the country, according to Godjon Helgason, a reporter at Icelandic National Broadcasting Service who spoke to NPR's Newscast unit.

[...] Gunnlaugsson intends to remain the head of Iceland's Progressive Party, FastFT reports. Earlier Tuesday, Gunnlaugsson had asked Icelandic President Olafur Ragnar Grimsson to call early elections and dissolve the current Parliament, the BBC reports, adding that Grimsson refused.

On Sunday, the German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung , along with other international news outlets that collaborated on the story, published a wave of reports about the murky underworld of shell companies and offshore bank accounts. The reporting was based on a massive trove of leaked emails and other documents from a Panamanian law firm.

[Continues...]

jrmcferren writes:

The Los Angeles Times Reports that due to the shutdown of gas reserve wells following the Porter Ranch (aka Aliso Canyon) Leak could see as many as 14 days this summer and up to 18 days this coming winter with scheduled blackouts due to insufficient gas and electricity supplies.

The canyon in the hills above Porter Ranch is a crucial gas storage facility, supplying 17 power plants in the Los Angeles Basin. But the four-month leak that began in October left the facility at one-fifth of its capacity and new injections of gas have been prohibited until all of its wells have passed comprehensive tests.

Officials estimate the storage facility won't be back on line for months, leaving local power plants without a key source of natural gas.

Original Submission

martyb writes:

SpaceX is scheduled to launch an ISS (International space Station) resupply mission from Cape Canaveral, Florida on Friday, April 8 at 4:43pm EDT (2043 UTC). According to a NASA press release, this will be the first time that SpaceX and Orbital ATK will both have spacecraft at the ISS. Further, it will mark there being six spacecraft docked at the ISS at the same time:

Although the SpaceX and Orbital ATK spacecraft have made 12 launches between them, this will be the first time that the two vehicles, contracted by NASA and developed by private industry to resupply the station, are connected to the space station at the same time. Orbital ATK's Cygnus, which launched to the station March 22, is already attached to the station's Unity Module. Dragon will take the port right next to it on the Earth facing side of the Harmony module. SpaceX made its first cargo resupply mission for NASA in 2012 and Orbital ATK followed with Cygnus the next year.

That vital role continues for this flight, which is the eighth cargo resupply mission for the Dragon. It will reach space on the power of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket lifting off Friday, April 8, from Space Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station.

[...] With the arrival of Dragon, the space station will tie the record for most vehicles on station at one time – six – which hasn't happened since 2011. Cygnus, two Soyuz and two Progress vehicles station are currently docked to the orbiting laboratory.

[...] One of the largest experiments loaded into Dragon will fly to space inside the unpressurized trunk section of the spacecraft. Compressed into a cylinder for launch, the Bigelow Expandable Activity Module will be mounted to a different port on the station where it will expand to a length of 13 feet with a 10.6-foot diameter width.

Known as BEAM, the 3,000-pound module does not have rigid, heavy side panels. Instead, it is made of thick material designed to safely hold air inside while being strong enough to resist micrometeorite damage. The flight is meant to determine whether the concept offers designers a way to build habitation modules or other structures in the future that expand after launch to create much larger spacecraft for deep-space missions, such as a journey to Mars.

As in past launches, SpaceX plans to attempt a landing of the booster stage. Though it has successfully performed a land-based landing, so far it has been unable to safely land its booster on a barge.

More information can be found at the NASA Blog and on ArsTechnica .

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"exec" writes:

Exploits for an Adobe Flash Player zero day vulnerability have been folded into two exploit kits that are distributing ransomware to infected machines.

https://threatpost.com/latest-flash-zero-day-being-used-to-push-ransomware/117248/

Exploits for a zero-day vulnerability in Adobe Flash Player are being aggressively distributed in two exploit kits. The zero day, meanwhile, was patched by Adobe in an emergency update released Thursday night.

Attackers are using the previously unpatched flaw in the maligned Flash Player to infect victims with either Locky or Cerber ransomware. Locky is a relatively new crypto-ransomware strain, spread primarily via spam with attachments enticing users to enable macros in Word documents that download the malware onto machines. Cerber is also crypto-ransomware that includes a feature where the infected machine will speak to the victim.

This turn in using the exploit kits to move ransomware isn't new, but does escalate the distribution of Locky in particular, which is believed to be at the heart of a number of high-profile compromises in the health care industry.

Researchers at Proofpoint said the zero day has been folded into both the Nuclear and Magnitude exploit kits, with Nuclear infections pushing Locky and Magnitude spreading Cerber.

The zero day vulnerability affects all versions of Flash Player on Windows 10 and earlier, said Kevin Epstein, vice president of Proofpoint's threat operations center. Today's update patched two dozen vulnerabilities, including the zero day; most the flaws were memory corruption bugs, as well as use-after-free, type-confusion and stack overflaws[sic], in addition to a security bypass vulnerability.

-- submitted from IRC

Though I suspect most Soylentils have removed Flash from their systems, they should be aware that friends and family members are vulnerable. Backups are your friend.

Original Submission

bob_super writes:

The LA Times reports on the Republican candidates' campaigns being offered all kinds of tech services to manage the upcoming brokered convention. The delegates from each state usually have their first vote mandated by laws, but if nobody wins the first round, everyone wants to know how to sway the next round.
In comes Big Data:

And in case you thought candidates' statements and positions would be a prime driver of a presidential candidate designation:

[Continues...]

DeathMonkey writes:

In an update to this story, Idaho Gov. C. L. "Butch" Otter vetoed legislation Tuesday that would have expressly permitted the use of the Bible in public school instruction, calling the measure unconstitutional.

"I have deep respect and appreciation for the Bible as religious doctrine as well as a piece of historic literature," Otter wrote in a letter accompanying the veto. "However, allowing S1342 to become law is a direct contravention to the Idaho Constitution and it could result for[sic] the loss of funding and costly litigation for Idaho public schools."

Idaho public school students are already allowed to reference the Bible and other religious texts in their studies, but the rejected legislation specifically mentions the Bible, stating the book could be used for reference purposes in subjects such as literature, history, music and world geography.

State lawmakers passed the measure in the final week of this year's session, after ignoring a warning from the attorney general's office that questioned its legality. A statement released by the office quoted the Idaho Constitution that prohibits the use of books that are of a sectarian or denomination character in public schools.

[Text of the bill is available on-line. Alternate link. -Ed.]

Original Submission

takyon writes:

Volvo will test up to one hundred self-driving cars in China, using local drivers:

Volvo aims to launch an experiment involving self-driving cars in China in which up to 100 such cars could be deployed, executives at the Swedish automaker said. The planned experiment, expected to be announced on Thursday, will see local drivers test the cars on public roads in everyday conditions but in limited driving situations such as on express roads and highways, they said.

Volvo, wholly owned by China's Zhejiang Geely Holding Group Co [GEELY.UL], is currently scouting for a city that could provide the necessary permissions, regulations and infrastructure to allow the experiment to go ahead, the executives said. They did not say by when it hopes to conduct the tests. The move is part of the Swedish company's efforts to take advantage of the pledges central government policymakers in China, the world's biggest auto market, have made to embrace futuristic technologies such as self-driving cars.

Volvo is also testing self-driving cars in Gothenburg, Sweden next year. Volvo says it is developing the technology as part of a commitment to reach zero deaths or serious injuries in new Volvo cars by 2020.

The Boston Consulting Group claims that China will be the largest market for autonomous vehicles in 15 years:

In fact, some argue that conditions in China are actually more favorable for quick adoption of driverless cars, in part because of more aggressive support from the national and local governments. And, unlike in the United States, China never fully developed a romance with the open road and car ownership.

[...] Even as American companies like Google and Tesla work on autonomous vehicles, a number of Chinese companies are working on driverless car technology. The Internet company Leshi Internet Information & Technology (better known as Letv) has a driverless car tech unit, and the Chinese carmaker Great Wall Motors has opened a research center in Silicon Valley. The assumed leader in the field in China is the search engine company Baidu, which has been at work on autonomous vehicles since 2013. [...] The Chinese government is playing a major role in the overall driverless market. Along with empowering Baidu to run public transportation, in other cases central and local governments have been investing in research and development for driverless car projects.

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frojack writes:

KOMO TV (Seattle) is carrying a story about unsolved "Cold Case" murders in Tacoma that occurred in 1986.

There were no witnesses. But DNA samples were found. So how were the sketches made?

The "composite sketches" were generated by a computer based on a process called DNA Phenotyping which is the prediction of physical appearance, using information extracted from DNA which accurately predicts genetic ancestry, eye color, hair color, skin color, freckling, and face shape in individuals from any ethnic background, even individuals with mixed ancestry.

The process was developed by Parabon Nanolabs and the process is explained on their web site.

How close are the predictions?

Parabon's website has some examples generated from DNA contributed by known volunteers. You can compare the sketches with photos of the volunteers and judge for yourself. Personally, I think Yolanda McClary's actual IMDB photo is virtually a dead ringer for the computer prediction.

Original Submission

-- OriginalOwner_ writes:

The Intercept reports

Baby Doe was 7 months old when his troubles with the U.S. government began. His mother was taking him on a flight when security officials stopped them at an airport. He was patted down and subjected to "chemical testing". His mother's bag was searched. His diapers were examined. Unbeknownst to the family from California, four letters on the infant's boarding pass--"SSSS"--had singled him out as a particularly dangerous class of individual: a "known or suspected terrorist".

The Free Thought Project continues

"The terrorism watch lists are premised on the false notion that the government can somehow accurately predict whether an innocent American citizen will commit a crime in the future based on religious affiliation or First Amendment activities", said Lena Masri, legal director for the Council of American-Islamic Relations, Michigan, in a statement released [April 6].

"Our lawsuits challenge the wrongful designation of thousands upon thousands of American Muslims as known or suspected terrorists without due process", she added.

The complaint,[PDF] filed in US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, on behalf of 18 plaintiffs, argues that the secret federal watch list consolidated on the government's Terrorist Screening Database (TSDB), includes the names of American citizens "based on mere guesses, hunches, and conjecture, and even simply based on matters of race, ethnicity, national origin, religion," and violates their constitutional rights.

The consequences of that designation not only affects people's ability to fly on airplanes, but also obtain licenses, a firearm, a bank account, a visa for relatives, or to wire transfer money, and conduct a normal life, argued the complaint.

Original Submission

frojack writes:

The burger flipping jobs that everybody denigrates may be on the way out. Some, of course, are happy to see them go, but more than a few teenagers may have one less option to earn their spending cash.

Automation may be paring one more person from each McDonald's counter. The already highly-optimized burger company may be looking to dispense their "Premium" McCafe espresso with automated self-serve stations in the seating area. The stations take credit cards as well as payment by NFC smartphones; they have no cash handling capabilities.

Some claim this is a direct response to the drive for minimum wage hikes gathering steam across the nation.

The company promised last June that the average wage in company stores nationwide would be $10/hr, -OR- one dollar above the locally-mandated minimum wage. While this minimum wage trend may make the automation more cost effective, others say the automation was inevitable on any low margin, high volume business.

(Note: This is in addition to several dozen Create Your Taste automated McDonalds restaurants opening across the country.)

Will the removal of low-paying jobs by arbitrarily pricing them above the cost of automation ultimately serve as a boon to society?

Original Submission

Phoenix666 writes:

Manufacturers produce high-end technology mostly top-down with large machinery, but small particles can build structures from the bottom up. A major challenge is that these particles easily clump together. Leiden physicist Daniela Kraft has developed a method to take advantage of this phenomenon. She has published her results in ACS Nano.

Smaller computer chips, narrow sound boxes, miniature cameras; we keep aiming for smaller and more complex technology, to carry with us or for applications like surgery. At the same time, it is increasingly difficult to build complex components on increasingly smaller scales. Thus, it could be much more convenient to build structures from the bottom-up, using tiny building blocks. That is the pursuit of the research group of Leiden physicist Daniela Kraft. She is working on a method to build structures from colloids— particles that are larger than nanoparticles but too small to see with the naked eye. Interestingly, colloids operate completely on their own, as independent building blocks.

They control the building process by adding salt or oil to the colloidal solution at specific times. This enables them to control the attractive Van der Waals forces and the surface tension. Under the influence of these forces, the randomly shaped chunks swell and reconfigure in a specific way. The type and concentration of salt and oil determine which structures the colloids form. By testing different combinations, Kraft now knows how to create a number of basic structures, from a simple dumb-bell shape to a pentagonal dipyramid. "Theoreticians have already predicted what kinds of useful larger structures we can build with these basic building blocks, but in practice, you never know what is actually going to happen."

Colloidal Recycling: Reconfiguration of Random Aggregates into Patchy Particles (DOI: 10.1021/acsnano.5b07901)

Original Submission