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takyon writes:

Microsoft Office now available on all Chromebooks

Microsoft has been testing out its Office apps on Chromebooks for the past year, but they've been mainly limited to Google's latest PixelBook device. It now appears that testing has concluded, and a number of Chromebooks are now reliably seeing the Office apps in the Google Play Store for Chromebooks. Chrome Unboxed reports that the apps are showing up on Samsung's Chromebook Pro, Acer's Chromebook 15, and Acer's C771.

The apps are Android versions of Office which include the same features you'd find on an Android tablet running Office. Devices like Asus' Chromebook Flip (with a 10.1-inch display) will get free access to Office on Chrome OS, but larger devices will need a subscription. Microsoft has a rule across Windows, iOS, and Android hardware that means devices larger than 10.1 inches need an Office 365 subscription to unlock the ability to create, edit, or print documents.

Also at Engadget.

Related: Microsoft Office for Android Phones Released
Microsoft Office 2013 is Now Working via CrossOver 16
LibreOffice 5.3 Ships with Experimental Office-Like Ribbon UI

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takyon writes:

Multiple states are preparing measures to monitor chronic wasting disease in their deer populations:

Despite rain and snow, thousands of Michigan hunters dragged their deer to check stations to be tested for chronic wasting disease — a condition that comes from the same family as "mad cow" disease.

"I was amazed that we had 150 deer come through the check station on the first day of gun season in Montcalm County," said Chad Stewart, Michigan Department of Natural Resources deer specialist. "Given the Wednesday opener and the bad weather, I was blown away."

Dollars generated from deer licenses and hunting-related purchases bring in millions in matching funds for habitat restoration and endangered species. They also help fund the testing for CWD, a demon of a disease that has been identified in 11 free-ranging Michigan deer and is feared to be on the verge of crossing over to humans. It just might alter the way we hunt forever.

"When they look back on the history of deer management in Michigan, these years will be considered pivotal to the culture of deer hunting," said Stewart. "I don't want people to think it's a death sentence for deer management. For now, there will be changes and additional restrictions. Change is hard to adapt to."

Montana drafting plans for hunt to monitor deer disease

Chronic wasting disease has been slowly spreading among deer, elk and moose in the Rocky Mountains, including Montana, Wyoming and Colorado. Symptoms include weight loss, listlessness and drooling.

Washington will restrict the import of deer carcasses from Montana.

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takyon writes:

England's National Health Service is urging parents to get their children vaccinated for the flu ahead of the holiday season to protect grandparents and other vulnerable relatives:

Flu vaccines administered through a nasal spray rather than an injection have been rolled out this autumn for two and three-year-olds, and children in reception class and years one to four in primary school. Children are super-spreaders because of the greater likelihood of them contracting flu at nursery or school, where germs are passed on at a rapid rate. But only 18% of school-age children have had the nasal spray immunisation, according to the latest figures.

Prof Keith Willett, NHS England's medical director for acute care, said: "Flu can be spread more easily by children, especially to vulnerable relatives such as older grandparents, those with heart or lung conditions and pregnant family members. Last year, millions of people missed out on their free vaccination and yet it's one simple, common sense step to help us all stay healthy this winter."

With less than a month until Christmas, the NHS is urging parents to book their children in for the free vaccination to help curb infection over the festive season, when family get-togethers can spread the infection.

Meanwhile, the Daily Mirror (a tabloid) claims that Russian agents are spreading anti-vaccination propaganda in the UK in an effort to destabilize the country:

Russian cyber units are spreading false information about flu and measles jabs in the UK, experts warn. [Ed's Note: The current flu immunisation is applied via a nasal spray - there are no 'jabs' involved.] Vladimir Putin is believed to want to erode trust in US and European governments. The state-sponsored units are spreading the lies on social media to destabilise Britain, it is claimed. The Kremlin has previously been accused of attempting to influence Brexit and Scottish independence. Now, it is feared it is trying to create distrust over flu jabs and the MMR measles vaccine.

[...] Security services are so concerned over the threat to public health and security that Government departments have been ordered to monitor social media and flag up risky articles. Health chiefs have had emerg­ency meetings over the spread "fake news" over vaccination campaigns. [...] We can reveal public health officials are investigating whether an outbreak of measles last week in Liverpool and Leeds was fuelled by parents not vaccinating children due to "false information read on the internet".

Also at BBC. BBC's collection of newspaper covers.

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takyon writes:

UNSW Canberra opens Australia's first space mission design facility

Australia's first national space mission design facility was officially opened today by ACT Chief Minister Andrew Barr at UNSW Canberra.

UNSW Canberra Space director Russell Boyce says the new Australian National Concurrent Design Facility (ANCDF) complements Australian National University's spacecraft test facilities and means Canberra now has the capability to develop space missions from start to finish.

"For the first time, Australia has a facility that will enable spacecraft design engineers and scientists to rapidly design and determine the technical and economic viability of proposed space missions," Professor Boyce said.

"Just yesterday, we announced the successful launch into orbit of our first cube satellite, 'Buccaneer', which was developed jointly with scientists from Defence Science Technology (DST). This is the first of many UNSW Canberra missions.

Previously: Is It Time for Australia to Launch its Own Space Agency?
Australia to Create its Own National Space Agency

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takyon writes:

Researchers from Sussex University Sackler Centre for Consciousness Science have applied a modified version of Google's DeepDream algorithm to panoramic video:

The researchers used a modified version of Deep Dream to process a panoramic video of the university campus. Then they showed it to 12 volunteers, finding that the visual hallucinations were similar to those brought on by psilocybin, the active ingredient in magic mushrooms.

The volunteers were asked questions like whether they felt a loss of control or a loss of their sense of self, and whether they saw patterns and colours. Their answers matched up closely with the results of a 2013 study [open, DOI: 10.1523/JNEUROSCI.2063-13.2013] [DX] into the experience of taking psilocybin.

In a second experiment, 22 participants were asked whether they felt any sense of temporal distortion, or a warped sense of time. In this case the responses were similar to those recorded after watching control videos.

That would seem to suggest the researchers' machine can replicate some, but not all, the effects of being high on psychedelic drugs. However, only a few volunteers have been tested so far, and they were a different group to those quizzed on psilocybin back in 2013.

This is just the beginning for the technology – the system is very flexible and can be tweaked in all kinds of ways. In the future, participants could even get to adjust the parameters of the experience themselves.

With better hardware, the algorithms could be run in real time and applied to an augmented reality view instead of a pre-recorded panoramic video.

Also at Newsweek.

A Deep-Dream Virtual Reality Platform for Studying Altered Perceptual Phenomenology (open, DOI: 10.1038/s41598-017-16316-2) (DX)

Related: Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?
Study Suggests Psilocybin "Resets" the Brains of Depressed People

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takyon writes:

Light pollution is getting worse across much of the globe, with the exception of countries like Yemen and Syria:

A study of pictures of Earth by night has revealed that artificial light is growing brighter and more extensive every year. Between 2012 and 2016, the planet's artificially lit outdoor area grew by more than 2% per year. Scientists say a "loss of night" in many countries is having negative consequences for "flora, fauna, and human well-being".

A team published the findings in the journal Science Advances. Their study used data from a Nasa satellite radiometer - a device designed specifically to measure the brightness of night-time light. It showed that changes in brightness over time varied greatly by country. Some of the world's "brightest nations", such as the US and Spain, remained the same. Most nations in South America, Africa and Asia grew brighter. [...]

• In 2016, the American Medical Association officially recognised the "detrimental effects of poorly designed, high-intensity LED lighting", saying it encouraged communities to "minimise and control blue-rich environmental lighting by using the lowest emission of blue light possible to reduce glare. The sleep-inducing hormone melatonin is particularly sensitive to blue light.
• A recent study published in the journal Nature [DOI: 10.1038/nature23288] [DX] revealed that artificial light was a threat to crop pollination - reducing the pollinating activity of nocturnal insects.
• Research in the UK revealed that trees in more brightly lit areas burst their buds up to a week earlier [open, DOI: 10.1098/rspb.2016.0813] [DX] than those in areas without artificial lighting.
• A study published earlier this year found that urban light installations "dramatically altered" the behaviour of nocturnally migrating birds.

Lead researcher Christopher Kyba from the German Research Centre for Geoscience in Potsdam said that the introduction of artificial light was "one of the most dramatic physical changes human beings have made to our environment".

Also at Sky & Telescope, NPR, and EurekAlert.

Artificially lit surface of Earth at night increasing in radiance and extent (open, DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.1701528) (DX)

Previously: Bring on the Night, say National Park Visitors in New Study
Light Pollution Prevents 80% of North Americans From Seeing the Milky Way
Study Shows That Artificial Lights Deter Nocturnal Pollinators

Original Submission

takyon writes:

Two economists are blaming Pokémon Go for causing traffic accidents and likely fatalities:

For a brief, shining period last summer, Pokémon Go reigned supreme. It brought obsession, joy, and, according to a new paper, injuries and death.

This working paper, appropriately and evocatively titled "Death by Pokemon Go," shows the darker side of the massively popular augmented reality game. Purdue University economists Mara Faccio and John McConnell combed through accident reports from Tippecanoe County, Indiana, in the first 148 days after the game was released in July 2016. In that county alone, the total value from injuries, damage, and the two lives lost is between $5.2 million and $25.5 million. If you scale this to cover the entire US, it would suggest that $2 billion to $7.3 billion were lost just in those few months.

The reports showed during those 148 days, 286 additional crashes occurred in the county, compared to the same period before. Of these, 134 were near pokéstops. In this scenario, it's crucial to determine that Pokémon Go caused these damages directly, as opposed to just causing people to be outside more, thus more likely to be hit by cars.

Also at PC Magazine.

Related: Peak Pokémon Go?
No Pokémon Go or Other AR Games in China
Russian Prosecutors Seek 3.5 Years for Blogger Who Played "Pokémon Go" in Church
Trial Will Decide Whether Milwaukee Can Require Permits for Using Locations in Augmented Reality

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An Anonymous Coward writes:

The New York Post reports:

Wall Street banks secretly shared client information in online chat rooms in order to rig auctions for the $14 trillion US Treasurys market, according to an explosive lawsuit filed in Manhattan federal court on [November 15].

The move wrongly fattened the banks' profits and picked profits from clients, the suit claims.

The new accusations, leveled by several pension funds and wealthy individual investors, are contained in an expanded class-action suit originally filed in July 2015 — and include an unusual twist: Some of the evidence came from confidential informants and one of the banks sued in the earlier action.

That bank is now cooperating with the plaintiffs in the massive civil action, and is providing an in-depth look into how Wall Street allegedly conspired to rig Treasury bond trades.

The revised lawsuit expands on details on how the banks conspired to set Treasury bond prices — like moves to manipulate the price of the bonds higher on days when there was a lot of demand, and vice versa, court papers claim.

Original Submission

Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:

In many parts of the world, like North America, using Wikipedia is taken for granted; hell, there are even Twitter accounts to track government employees editing the internet's free encyclopedia while on the clock. But in other places, like Turkey or Syria, using Wikipedia can be difficult, and even dangerous.

For example, Wikipedia is still blocked in Turkey after the government restricted access to the site during a crackdown on dissident elements after a failed coup. Syrian-Palestinian digital activist and Wikipedia editor Bassel Khartabil is believed to have been executed by the Syrian government. To make using Wikipedia safer for at-risk users, former Facebook security engineer Alec Muffett has started an experimental dark net Wikipedia service that gives visitors some strong privacy protections. The project is unofficial; for now, Wikipedia isn't involved.

The service is accessible through the Tor browser, which routes your connection through several "hops" around the world to hide your location from anybody trying to track you. The normal version of Wikipedia is already accessible through Tor, but to get there a user's traffic has to exit the private Tor network, opening them to surveillance at the point where their traffic becomes unencrypted. Instead, Muffett has created what's known as an onion service for Wikipedia on the Tor network. That means your traffic never leaves the safely encrypted confines of Tor, keeping it hidden.

"Onion sites are considered to be about 'anonymity', but really they offer two more features: Discretion (e.g.: your employer or ISP cannot see what you are browsing, not even what site) and trust (if you access facebookcorewwwi.onion you are definitely connected to Facebook, because of the nature of Onion addressing)," Muffett wrote me in an email.

"The code is free and libre," he added. "I am doing it because it's worth doing."

[...] An onion service for Wikipedia has been a point of discussion in the Wikipedia community for a while, but Muffett seems to be the first person to actually create one. He pledged on Twitter to "keep it running for a few days," but with enough community support one could see Wikipedia on Tor becoming permanent.

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An Anonymous Coward informs us of a link:

USA Today

For decades, proponents of oil and gas drilling have viewed Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge as an area rich with natural resources that could help fuel the United States' drive for energy independence.

Now, Congress may be on the verge of finally handing them permission to deliver on an old Republican mantra: Drill, baby, drill.

The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee voted 13-10 last week to approve a bill that would allow oil and gas exploration in the refuge's 1.5-million-acre coastal plain. The measure will be added to the Senate's tax-reform package that is expected to be put to a vote before the end of the year.

And:

Alaska drilling tucked into tax bill:

The multi-decade fight over allowing drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) could quickly be resolved if the GOP-controlled Congress approves the massive tax overhaul package. The bill includes language that opens up ANWR for drilling, and it will be taken up by the Senate this week, although the vote could be delayed if the Senate struggles to put together enough votes. The outcome of the legislation is unclear.

Also at Quad-Cities Online (opinion) and Alaska Public Radio

Original Submission

Whoever writes:

We may be headed for an ice apocalypse which could result in the flooding of coastal cities before the end of this century. Glaciers in Antarctica may break and release ice, exposing taller cliffs, resulting in faster melting.

"In the past few years, scientists have identified marine ice-cliff instability as a feedback loop that could kickstart the disintegration of the entire West Antarctic ice sheet this century — much more quickly than previously thought."

[...] A wholesale collapse of Pine Island and Thwaites would set off a catastrophe. Giant icebergs would stream away from Antarctica like a parade of frozen soldiers. All over the world, high tides would creep higher, slowly burying every shoreline on the planet, flooding coastal cities and creating hundreds of millions of climate refugees.

Original Submission

"Arthur T Knackerbracket" writes:

Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:

News outlets and blogs will frequently compare DDoS attacks by the volume of traffic that a victim receives. Surely this makes some sense, right? The greater the volume of traffic a victim receives, the harder to mitigate an attack - right?

At least, this is how things used to work. An attacker would gain capacity and then use that capacity to launch an attack. With enough capacity, an attack would overwhelm the victim's network hardware with junk traffic such that they can no longer serve legitimate requests. If your web traffic is served by a server with a 100 Gbps port and someone sends you 200 Gbps, your network will be saturated and the website will be unavailable.

Recently, this dynamic has shifted as attackers have gotten far more sophisticated. The practical realities of the modern Internet have increased the amount of effort required to clog up the network capacity of a DDoS victim - attackers have noticed this and are now choosing to perform attacks higher up the network stack.

In recent months, Cloudflare has seen a dramatic reduction in simple attempts to flood our network with junk traffic. Whilst we continue to see large network level attacks, in excess of 300 and 400 Gbps, network level attacks in general have become far less common (the largest recent attack was just over 0.5 Tbps). This has been especially true since the end of September when we made official a policy that would not remove any customers from our network merely for receiving a DDoS attack that's too big, including those on our free plan.

Far from attackers simply closing shop, we see a trend whereby attackers are moving to more advanced application-layer attack strategies. This trend is not only seen in metrics from our automated attack mitigation systems, but has also been the experience of our frontline customer support engineers. Whilst we continue to see very large network level attacks, note that they are occurring less frequently since the introduction of Unmetered Mitigation.

The article goes on to explain how the attacks have changed and what techniques are currently popular.

Original Submission

An Anonymous Coward writes:

https://www.theverge.com/2017/3/29/15100620/congress-fcc-isp-web-browsing-privacy-fire-sale

Republicans in Congress just voted to reverse a landmark FCC privacy rule that opens the door for ISPs to sell customer data. Lawmakers provided no credible reason for this being in the interest of Americans, except for vague platitudes about "consumer choice" and "free markets," as if consumers at the mercy of their local internet monopoly are craving to have their web history quietly sold to marketers and any other third party willing to pay.

The only people who seem to want this are the people who are going to make lots of money from it. (Hint: they work for companies like Comcast, Verizon, and AT&T.) Incidentally, these people and their companies routinely give lots of money to members of Congress.

So here [below in the article] is a list of the lawmakers who voted to betray you, and how much money they received from the telecom industry in their most recent election cycle.

Original Submission

janrinok writes:

Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:

Soft robotic actuators, which are pneumatic artificial muscles designed and programmed to perform lifelike motions, have recently emerged as an attractive alternative to more rigid components that have conventionally been used in biomedical devices. In fact, earlier this year, a Boston Children's Hospital team revealed a proof-of-concept soft robotic sleeve that could support the function of a failing heart.

Despite this promising innovation, the team recognized that many pediatric heart patients have more one-sided heart conditions. These patients are not experiencing failure of the entire heart -- instead, congenital conditions have caused disease in either the heart's right or left ventricle, but not both.

"We set out to develop new technology that would help one diseased ventricle, when the patient is in isolated left or right heart failure, pull blood into the chamber and then effectively pump it into the circulatory system," says Nikolay Vasilyev, MD, a researcher in cardiac surgery at Boston Children's.

Now, Vasilyev and his collaborators -- including researchers from Boston Children's, the Harvard John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences and the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard University -- have revealed their soft robotic solution. They describe their system in a paper published online in Science Robotics today.

Original Submission

Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:

Experimental support for Microsoft's Linux containers on Windows (LCOW) feature has been available for Windows Server 1709 via the Docker EE "Preview" release. The same functionality is now available for Windows 10 Fall Creators Update with the release of Docker for Windows 17.11. In fact, it's been available since Docker for Windows 17.10.

That's right. Docker for Windows can run Linux or Windows containers, with support for Linux containers via a Hyper-V Moby Linux VM (as of Docker for Windows 17.10 this VM is based on LinuxKit).

When configured to use Linux containers for Windows, try running a simple Linux container:

When disabled, the existing options for switching between traditional Docker for Windows Linux containers and Windows containers will be available in the whale systray icon.

The LCOW feature is under active development.

Original Submission