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MrPlow writes:

Submitted via IRC for SoyCow5743

Apple's limits on tracking will "sabotage the economic model for the Internet."

Apple's latest operating systems for the Mac and iPhone will soon be rolling out, and with that comes new restrictions on ad-tracking in the Safari browser. Adding a 24-hour limit on ad targeting cookies is good for privacy under Apple's new "Intelligent Tracking Prevention" feature. But if you're an advertiser, the macOS High Sierra and iOS 11 Safari browsers spell gloom and doom for the Internet as we know it. The reason is because Safari is making it harder for advertisers to follow users as they surf the Internet—and that will dramatically reduce the normal bombardment of ads reflecting the sites Internet surfers have visited earlier. Six major advertising groups have just published an open letter blasting the new tracking restrictions Apple unveiled in June. They say they are "deeply concerned" about them:

The infrastructure of the modern Internet depends on consistent and generally applicable standards for cookies, so digital companies can innovate to build content, services, and advertising that are personalized for users and remember their visits. Apple's Safari move breaks those standards and replaces them with an amorphous set of shifting rules that will hurt the user experience and sabotage the economic model for the Internet.

Apple's unilateral and heavy-handed approach is bad for consumer choice and bad for the ad-supported online content and services consumers love. Blocking cookies in this manner will drive a wedge between brands and their customers, and it will make advertising more generic and less timely and useful.

The letter is signed by the American Association of Advertising Agencies, the American Advertising Federation, the Association of National Advertisers, the Data & Marketing Association, the Interactive Advertising Bureau, and the Network Advertising Initiative.

Source: https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2017/09/ad-industry-deeply-concerned-about-safaris-new-ad-tracking-restrictions/

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MrPlow writes:

Submitted via IRC for SoyCow5743

Roaming data use makes customers unprofitable, so Verizon will cut them off.

Verizon is disconnecting another 8,500 rural customers from its wireless network, saying that roaming charges have made certain customer accounts unprofitable for the carrier.

The 8,500 customers have 19,000 lines and live in 13 states (Alaska, Idaho, Iowa, Indiana, Kentucky, Maine, Michigan, Missouri, Montana, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Utah, and Wisconsin), a Verizon Wireless spokesperson told Ars today. They received notices of disconnection this month and will lose access to Verizon service on October 17.

"These customers live outside of areas where Verizon operates our own network," Verizon said. "Many of the affected consumer lines use a substantial amount of data while roaming on other providers' networks and the roaming costs generated by these lines exceed what these consumers pay us each month."

"We sent these notices in advance so customers have plenty of time to choose another wireless provider," Verizon also said.

Source: https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2017/09/verizon-kicks-8500-rural-customers-off-network-for-using-roaming-data/

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MrPlow writes:

Submitted via IRC for SoyCow5743

Google will automatically [begin a delayed - Ed] delete all of a user's Android backup files — stored in his Google Drive account — if the user does not use his phone for two weeks. After Google detects this period of inactivity, it will start a 60-day counter for old Android backup files. After that counter reaches zero, Google will delete the backup files from the user's Drive account.

The auto-delete function was discovered this week by a Reddit user who used it to create backups for a defective Nexus 6P. The user sent back the phone, and while he waited for a replacement, he saw that his Nexus 6P backup files stored were marked for deletion.

[...] People who rely on Android's built-in Drive-based backup system should keep an eye out on the Backups folder. Storing backups offline or using specialized backup & restore Android apps is an alternative.

Source: https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/mobile/google-will-auto-delete-android-backups-if-users-dont-use-their-phones-for-2-weeks/

Original Submission

"exec" writes:

Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:

The accelerating expansion of the Universe may not be real, but could just be an apparent effect, according to new research published in the journal Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. The new study—by a group at the University of Canterbury in Christchurch, New Zealand—finds the fit of Type Ia supernovae to a model universe with no dark energy to be very slightly better than the fit to the standard dark energy model.

Dark energy is usually assumed to form roughly 70% of the present material content of the Universe. However, this mysterious quantity is essentially a place-holder for unknown physics.

Current models of the Universe require this dark energy term to explain the observed acceleration in the rate at which the Universe is expanding. Scientists base this conclusion on measurements of the distances to supernova explosions in distant galaxies, which appear to be farther away than they should be if the Universe's expansion were not accelerating.

However, just how statistically significant this signature of cosmic acceleration is has been hotly debated in the past year. The previous debate pitted the standard Lambda Cold Dark Matter (ΛCDM) cosmology against an empty universe whose expansion neither accelerates nor decelerates. Both of these models though assume a simplified 100 year old cosmic expansion law -- Friedmann's equation.

Reference: Lawrence H. Dam, Asta Heinesen, David L. Wiltshire. Apparent cosmic acceleration from Type Ia supernovae. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 2017; 472 (1): 835 DOI: 10.1093/mnras/stx1858

-- submitted from IRC

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MrPlow writes:

Submitted via IRC for SoyCow5743

When the Chinese government announced a ban on initial coin offerings last week, it looked like an attempt to rein in the speculative excesses of the cryptocurrency economy. But now it seems like it might have been the start of something more ambitious: a coordinated campaign to shut down use of cryptocurrency in the Middle Kingdom.

The full extent of the Chinese crackdown isn't clear yet, in part because key decisions have only been communicated privately to Chinese Bitcoin exchanges. But a couple of Bitcoin exchanges have now announced that they are shutting down. And leaked documents suggest that the rest will be required to do so before the end of the month. Chinese users will be given a chance to withdraw their funds before the exchanges shut down.

"BTCChina encourages customers to withdraw their funds as quickly as possible," one of the exchanges wrote in a Friday tweet. "Customers can withdraw their funds whenever they want."

Bitcoin has always been something of an awkward fit for China, which strictly regulates financial markets and limits the flow of funds overseas. Chinese officials have apparently concluded that Bitcoin has become too popular as a way to circumvent those regulations.

Source: https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2017/09/china-may-be-getting-ready-to-ban-bitcoin/

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MrPlow writes:

Submitted via IRC for SoyCow1937

One day last month, Kansas City resident Victoria Tane's Google Fiber Internet service stopped working.

It turned out that Google Fiber cut off her Internet access because she owed 12 cents after an odd series of events involving an unused e-mail address, automated customer account systems, and a sales tax increase. Google Fiber quickly restored her connection and forgave the 12-cent balance after she called customer service, but the incident highlights a problem that Google Fiber may need to fix in order to prevent other customers from losing service over similarly trivial amounts.

The Kansas City Star of Missouri detailed what happened in a story yesterday. Tane has Google Fiber's basic 5Mbps Internet service which has no monthly payment and required only a $300 construction fee. Google Fiber no longer offers that package to new customers, but those who signed up for it and paid the construction fee can use the service with no further payments for a total of seven years.

Tane "paid the total upfront" a year ago, the Star wrote. "$300 to connect, plus $25.08 for taxes and fees. Transaction done. Free for seven years."

Source: https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2017/09/google-fiber-shut-off-customers-service-because-she-owed-12-cents/

Original Submission

canopic jug writes:

Voice inversion is a primitive method of rendering speech unintelligible to prevent eavesdropping of radio or telephone calls. I wrote about some simple ways to reverse it in a previous post. I've since written a software tool, deinvert (on GitHub), that does all this for us. It can also descramble a slightly more advanced scrambling method called split-band inversion. Let's see how that happens behind the scenes.

http://www.windytan.com/2017/09/descrambling-split-band-voice-inversion.html

Original Submission

canopic jug writes:

The other day, Michael W Lucas, who is normally known for good technical literature, put up a wild experiment of a short story: Savaged by Systemd. It's erotica, sort of. It's computer erotica, to be specific. It's Linux sysadmin erotica, to be more specific. OK, fine, it's systemd erotica. Really. Anyway, despite the subject and the genre, and in spite of the combination of the two, the e-book is trending and rising in quite a few lists.

Hopefully he can still remain focused on Absolute FreeBSD and be able to get that finished by the next BSDCan.

[Ed note: Has anybody actually bought and read this short story? I wasn't going to spend $2.99 to see what the hubub was about. - cmn32480]

Original Submission

MrPlow writes:

Submitted via IRC for SoyCow1937

The FTC said Tuesday [September 5] that it cannot stop computer makers from selling computers that inject ads into webpages to US consumers. The statement covers Lenovo's practice of having sold computers pre-installed with the so-called VisualDiscovery adware developed by a company called Superfish. This adware, which was installed on computers without consumers' knowledge, hijacked encrypted Web sessions that made users vulnerable to HTTPS man-in-the-middle attacks and shared user browsing data with third parties.

In a Tuesday court settlement with Lenovo, the FTC said the Chinese hardware maker, or any computer company for that matter, was free to sell computers with the adware made from a company called Superfish—as long as consumers consented before it was downloaded on the machine.

"As part of the settlement with the FTC, Lenovo is prohibited from misrepresenting any features of software preloaded on laptops that will inject advertising into consumers' Internet browsing sessions or transmit sensitive consumer information to third parties. The company must also get consumers' affirmative consent before pre-installing this type of software," the FTC announced.

According to a Reuters article Lenovo paid a fine of $3.5million dollars as part of the settlement.

Source: https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2017/09/ftc-slaps-lenovo-on-the-wrist-for-selling-computers-with-secret-adware/

Original Submission

tonyPick writes:

Spotted at HackerNews is a link to a multipart series from Pennsylvania's PennLive and several collaborating outlets on the wins of improbably lucky lottery players.

On, Dec. 29, 2016, Clarance Jones did something that most Americans could scarcely imagine: He cashed-in 20 winning scratch-off tickets, collectively worth $21,000, one after the other.

For the average lottery player, that would be the ultimate payday. For Jones, it was practically routine.

In the past six years, the 79-year-old from Lynn, Mass., has won more than 7,300 lottery tickets, totaling $10.8 million. That establishes him, by far, as the luckiest lottery player in America.

But that luck, experts say, is unlikely to be what it seems. And Jones is not alone in raising eyebrows

The three part series goes on to look at the patterns of frequent winners, and the attitudes of lottery retailers to these apparent runs of incredible good fortune.

In Pennsylvania alone, more than 200 players have won at least 50 prizes of $600 or more in the past 16 years.

Statisticians approached by PennLive say many of those wins are difficult to explain by luck. In other states, investigations into frequent winners have sometimes found their wins are rooted in theft and cheating, or schemes relating to tax evasion and money laundering.

"From a statistical point of view it stinks to high heaven," said Ronald Wasserstein, executive director of the American Statistical Association.

The Pennsylvania Lottery, however, has a different view: Its most frequent winners are simply frequent players.

The Original HackerNews Thread and reporting from the Columbia Journal on the FOIA requests which underly the reporting. There are associated articles in The Boston Globe, New York Daily News, Hartford Courant, and the Cleveland Plain Dealer.

Original Submission

canopic jug writes:

September 15^th was the 30th anniversary of the anniversary of X11

The X11 window system turns 30 years old today! X11 which still lives on through today via the X.Org Server on Linux, BSD, Solaris, and other operating systems is now three decades old.

It was on this day in 1987 that Ralph Swick of MIT announced the X Window System Version 11 Release 1. As explained in the announcement compared to earlier versions of X, X11 offered "This release represents a major redesign and enhancement of X and signals it's graduation from the research community into the product engineering and development community. The X Window System version 11 is intended to be able to support virtually all known instances of raster display hardware and reasonable future hardware, including hardware supporting deep frame buffers, multiple colormaps and various levels of hardware graphics assist."

https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=X11-Turns-30

[As a point of reference, Intel introduced the 80386 in 1985 and the 80386SX variant in 1988. --Ed.]

Original Submission

Phoenix666 writes:

Varsity esports teams are becoming increasingly common on college campuses as more schools tap into the rising popularity of competitive gaming.

Experts say 50 U.S. colleges have formed varsity gaming teams that offer at least partial scholarships over the past three years, and many have hired coaches and analysts like other sports teams.

Michael Brooks is executive director of the National Association of Collegiate eSports. He says it has grown "dramatically" and caught organizers off guard.

The success of professional esports has spurred many smaller schools to start varsity teams as a way to boost enrollment numbers.

Among those with new teams is the College of St. Joseph, a school of 260 students in Vermont. The school's athletic director says "nearly every kid on campus wants to be a part of this."

"Dear Admissions Committee, I should get a full sports scholarship because I'm, like, really good at Pong and stuff."

Original Submission

Phoenix666 writes:

It's 2017. Why are there still Nazis?

It's a question many observers are asking after hundreds of white supremacists, many displaying swastikas and Confederate battle flags and shouting racist, anti-Semitic, and anti-communist slogans, took to the streets of Charlottesville, Va., this weekend, provoking violence that claimed the life of one counter-protester and resulted in multiple injuries.

The continued existence of people who hold openly white supremacist ideologies more than seven decades after the fall of the Third Reich can be explained, in part, through a social theory developed in the early 1990s. Social dominance theory seeks to explain how hierarchy-enhancing ideologies do not just drive social inequality, but are also a result of it. It suggests that a single personality trait, called social dominance orientation (SDO), strongly predicts a person's political and social views, from foreign policy and criminal justice to civil rights and the environment. What's more, it offers insight into how ideologies such as racism, sexism, and xenophobia tend to arise from the unequal distribution of a society's resources.

"Social dominance theory provides a yardstick for measuring social and political ideologies," says Felicia Pratto, who developed the theory with fellow psychologist Jim Sidanius. "SDO is one way – not the only one – to try to figure out what those ideologies are 'about.'"

You too can take the Social Dominance Orientation quiz to determine your nazi quotient.

Original Submission

MrPlow writes:

Submitted via IRC for Runaway1956

The 450-foot-long boat is one of three in its class and is specially modified to conduct some of America's most covert underwater operations. That fact alone — as Keddie points out — makes the appearance of the black and white flag significant.

[...] So why did it a U.S. submarine return home flying an undoubtedly British tradition? Much is unclear. U.S. submarine activity is rarely discussed by the Pentagon, and the vessels operate in almost complete secrecy. While it's unlikely the Carter torpedoed an enemy ship or fired one of its cruise missiles, the flag could represent the success of a more covert mission. The Carter can insert commandos, deploy unmanned submersible vehicles, and likely splice undersea cables all while using specially outfitted thrusters to almost hover off the seafloor. One of the Seawolf class's namesake participated in the Cold War-era operation Ivy Bells that saw U.S. submarines tapping Soviet underwater communication lines.

Source: Why did one of the US Navy's most advanced subs return to port with a pirate flag?

Also:

The ominous Jolly Roger is an important part of submariner lore and conveys a clear message when it is flown atop a submarine's conning tower.

Source: Why The Navy's Top Spy Submarine Flew A Pirate Flag While Pulling Into Port

Original Submission #1  Original Submission #2 

Leave Blank writes:

Some viewers of a new episode of South Park found themselves with "warped smart home lists."

We spend a lot of time talking about South Park's sometimes insightful, sometimes tone deaf social commentary, but Matt Stone and South Park if it wasn't also vulgar, immature, and just a bit obnoxious. That side of the show made itself known with Season 21's premiere, and fans have the warped smart home lists to prove it.

The central plot of "White People Renovating Houses" follows a gang of Confederate flag-waving protesters who are infuriated that automation has negated their jobs. That side of the episode is at times scathing in its critique of enraged blue collar workers and incredibly silly when it came to the white people renovating houses plot. However, the best moments definitely come from the boys asking Amazon Echo's Alexa to do and say increasingly disgusting things. It's a very dumb joke that never gets old because who hasn't asked their smart home device something idiotic?

It's also a joke that's translated to the real world because most of these bits intentionally started with the keywords "Alexa," "Okay Google," and "Hey Siri." Of course real Amazon Echos, Google Homes, and iHomes were happy to respond. Cortana was (not so) mysteriously missing from the AI party.

Previously: News Anchor Sets Off Alexa Devices Around San Diego Ordering Unwanted Dollhouses

Original Submission