SoylentNews

Fnord666 writes:

Apple had a shockingly bad week of software problems just before the end of 2017, and it looks like 2018 isn't starting so well either. A new bug has been discovered in iOS 11 that lets people send a specific character that will crash an iPhone and block access to the Messages app in iOS and popular apps like WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, Outlook for iOS, and Gmail. Italian Blog Mobile World spotted the bug, and we've tested it successfully on multiple iPhones running iOS 11.2.5, and found it also works on the macOS versions of Safari and Messages. Apple plans to fix the problem in an iOS update before the release of iOS 11.3 this spring.

The bug itself involves sending an Indian language (Telugu) character to devices, and Apple's iOS Springboard will crash once the message has been received. Messages will no longer open as the app is trying and failing to load the character, and it appears that the only way to regain access to your iMessages is to have another friend send you a message and try to delete the thread that contained the bad character.

We've also tested the bug on third-party apps like Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp, Gmail, and Outlook for iOS and found that these apps can become disabled once a message is received.

[...] Update, 3:30PM ET: Apple plans to fix the issue in an update before the iOS 11.3 release this spring.

Source: The Verge

Original Submission

takyon writes:

Merck has ended a trial for the experimental Alzheimer's treatment verubecestat, a BACE1 inhibitor, after it was found to be ineffective. Biogen has increased the sample size of a trial for aducanumab, worrying some investors. The news comes after the failure of drugs such as solanezumab and intepirdine to treat Alzheimer's and dementia.

The FDA has proposed new guidelines that would make it easier to treat Alzheimer's by lowering the bar for clinical success:

In proposed new guidelines released on Thursday, the FDA appears open to trial goals that better match early patient populations, including people who have yet to display memory loss or functional impairment, such as the ability to wash or dress themselves or cook meals.

The draft guidelines suggest that improvement in biomarkers, such as amount of beta amyloid in the brain, a protein linked to the disease, may be an acceptable goal for deeming a drug successful in patients with no symptoms. FDA guidelines used in prior studies demanded that a drug demonstrate both cognitive and functional improvements.

A bipartisan group of Senators and Congressman have introduced the Concentrating on High-Value Alzheimer's Needs to Get to an End (CHANGE) Act, which would also reduce regulatory barriers faced by clinical trials. The annual cost of Alzheimer's and dementia care in the U.S. is projected to rise to $1.1 trillion by 2050.

Meanwhile, a group of researchers has found that targeting BACE1 enzymes could remove existing amyloid plaques (in mice):

Knocking back an enzyme swept mouse brains clean of protein globs that are a sign of Alzheimer's disease. Reducing the enzyme is known to keep these nerve-damaging plaques from forming. But the disappearance of existing plaques was unexpected [open, DOI: 10.1084/jem.20171831] [DX], researchers report online February 14 in the Journal of Experimental Medicine.

The brains of mice engineered to develop Alzheimer's disease were riddled with these plaques, clumps of amyloid-beta protein fragments, by the time the animals were 10 months old. But the brains of 10-month-old Alzheimer's mice that had a severely reduced amount of an enzyme called BACE1 were essentially clear of new and old plaques.

An Alzheimer's treatment, donepezil, has been used to treat alcohol-related brain damage in mice.

PiMuNu writes:

Dark matter, neutrinos and tachyons in the same abstract? Oh yes:

According to conventional wisdom the 5-hour early Mont Blanc burst probably was not associated with SN 1987A, but if it was genuine, some exotic physics explanation had to be responsible. Here we consider one truly exotic explanation, namely faster-than-light neutrinos having sourcemν2=−0.38keV2. It is shown that the Mont Blanc burst is consistent with the distinctive signature of that explanation i.e., an 8 MeV antineutrino line from SN 1987A. It is further shown that a model of core collapse supernovae involving dark matter particles of mass 8 MeV would in fact yield an 8 MeV antineutrino line

Journal paper: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0927650517303341
arxiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/1701.00488v8

Original Submission

MrPlow writes:

Submitted via IRC for TheMightyBuzzard

A Subnautica developer has reportedly been fired over controversial comments he previously posted to Twitter, with the game's sound designer Simon Chylinski tweeting that he has been ousted from his position at Unknown Worlds Entertainment.

Chylinski has come under fire recently after a number of recent comments he posted to Twitter were placed under the spotlight. The sound designer took to Twitter yesterday to post an update on his status with Unknown Worlds Entertainment, tweeting: "so. i just got fired.. :("

Isn't it illegal to fire someone for their political views in California? Unknown Worlds Entertainment may be in for one hell of an uncapped damages lawsuit.

Source: http://www.gamerevolution.com/news/366749-subnautica-dev-fired-controversial-twitter-comments

Original Submission

takyon writes:

Data from the Kepler spacecraft's extended mission has been used to confirm 95 new exoplanet discoveries:

"We started out analyzing 275 candidates of which 149 were validated as real exoplanets. In turn 95 of these planets have proved to be new discoveries," said American PhD student Andrew Mayo at the National Space Institute (DTU Space) at the Technical University of Denmark.

[...] The Kepler spacecraft was launched in 2009 to hunt for exoplanets in a single patch of sky, but in 2013 a mechanical failure crippled the telescope. However, astronomers and engineers devised a way to repurpose and save the space telescope by changing its field of view periodically. This solution paved the way for the follow up K2 mission, which is still ongoing as the spacecraft searches for exoplanet transits.

[...] One of the planets detected was orbiting a very bright star. "We validated a planet on a 10 day orbit around a star called HD 212657, which is now the brightest star found by either the Kepler or K2 missions to host a validated planet. Planets around bright stars are important because astronomers can learn a lot about them from ground-based observatories," said Mayo.

275 candidates and 149 validated planets orbiting bright stars in K2 campaigns 0-10 (open, DOI: 10.3847/1538-3881/aaadff) (DX)

This work, in addition to increasing the population of validated K2 planets by more than 50% and providing new targets for follow-up observations, will also serve as a framework for validating candidates from upcoming K2 campaigns and the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS), expected to launch in 2018.

Original Submission

canopic jug writes:

Mark J. Wielaard has written a brief blog post about a crucial license change for the dtrace performance analysis and troubleshooting tool. It has been available for most other systems, notably Solaris derivatives, FreeBSD, and OS X, but not for Linux. That may change soon, or at least have the possibility to change.

At Fosdem we had a talk on dtrace for linux in the Debugging Tools devroom.

Not explicitly mentioned in that talk, but certainly the most exciting thing, is that Oracle is doing a proper linux kernel port:

commit e1744f50ee9bc1978d41db7cc93bcf30687853e6

Author: Tomas Jedlicka <tomas.jedlicka@oracle.com>
Date: Tue Aug 1 09:15:44 2017 -0400

dtrace: Integrate DTrace Modules into kernel proper

This changeset integrates DTrace module sources into the main kernel source tree under the GPLv2 license. Sources have been moved to appropriate locations in the kernel tree.

That is right, dtrace dropped the CDDL and switched to the GPL!

This change improves the utility of dtrace and gives a badly needed boost to Oracle's image. So will the license for ZFS be corrected next?

Source : dtrace for linux; Oracle does the right thing.

Original Submission

stormwyrm writes:

Argumentum ad hominem, a well-known fallacy that involves attacking the character or motive of the person making the argument rather than arguing their claims on their merits, is frequently encountered, and despite being fallacious, it is disturbingly effective. A new study in PLOS One (open, DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0192025) sheds some further light on just how effective the various types of ad hominem attacks are in the context of scientific claims. An article from Psypost reports on the findings:

Ad hominem arguments — attacking a person to disprove his or her claims — is considered a logical fallacy. But a new study published in PLOS One suggests that some ad hominem attacks can effectively erode people's trust in scientific claims.

The research found that attacking the motives of scientists undermines the belief in a scientific claim just as much as attacking the science itself.

[...] "One key finding is that if members of the general public are aware of a conflict of interest connected to a scientific finding, then this will seriously undermine their faith in that finding," Barnes told PsyPost. "What the study does is allow us to quantitatively compare the amount of attitude change based on knowledge of conflict of interest to the amount of attitude change based on knowledge of outright research fraud and misconduct (such as faking the data)."

"What we see is that knowledge of conflict of interest is just as powerful as knowledge of research fraud."

Further commentary on the study by Orac at Respectful Insolence.

Original Submission

takyon writes:

Netflix's CEO offered to resign from Facebook's board in 2016, citing his fellow board member Peter Thiel's support of Donald Trump:

Netflix CEO Reed Hastings — who called his fellow board member Thiel's support of Trump "catastrophically bad judgment" in an email leaked to the Times — also offered to resign over his disagreement with Thiel, according to a Wall Street Journal report published Thursday. Sources told WSJ that Facebook CEO Zuckerberg declined Hastings' offer to resign. Facebook declined to comment on the matter to Business Insider.

Now, Thiel may resign from Facebook's board instead in the midst of packing up and leaving the Bay area:

The founder of PayPal and a prominent investor in Silicon Valley, Thiel is reportedly moving his investment firms Thiel Capital and Thiel Foundation out of the Bay Area and into Los Angeles this year, according to WSJ.

In L.A., Thiel is also reportedly planning to build "a right-leaning media outlet to foster discussion and community around conservative topics." Thiel bankrolled the lawsuits that eventually forced Gawker Media into bankruptcy, and has been trying to buy Gawker's now-defunct flagship site.

Although Thiel has called Silicon Valley a "one-party state", in the 2016 Presidential election, Hillary Clinton beat President Trump 72 percent to 22 percent in Los Angeles County.

The Guardian also has an article about Thiel's involvement in New Zealand.

Also at Ars Technica, The Mercury News, LA Times, and Vanity Fair.

Related: Peter Thiel Acquires NZ Citizenship and Large Property
Everything Wrong with Peter Thiel's Doomsday Survival Plan
University Could Lose Millions From "Unethical" Research Backed by Peter Thiel
"Black Hole" of Accountability for Drug Trials Flouting FDA Oversight?
Peter Thiel Makes a Bid for Gawker.com

Original Submission

c0lo writes:

Picked this on Bruce Schneier's CRYPTO-GRAM latest issue, under the very terse description of

Interesting research: "Long-term market implications of data breaches, not," by Russell Lange and Eric W. Burger. The market isn't going to fix this. If we want better security, we need to regulate the market.

The "Long term implications..." link is paywalled, but there are two other recent(ish) academic papers linked.

The first one, "Market Implications of Data Breaches" by Russell Lange and Eric W. Burger (21 PDF pages, title page, ToC and references included). The "executive summary/key findings":

• While the difference in stock price between the sampled breached companies and their peers was negative (-1.13%) in the first three days following announcement of a breach, by the 14th day the return difference had rebounded to +0.05%, and on average remained positive through the period assessed.
• For the differences in the breached companies' betas and the beta of their peer sets, the differences in the means of 8 months pre-breach versus post-breach was not meaningful at 90, 180, and 360-day post-breach periods.
• For the differences in the breached companies' beta correlations against the peer indices pre- and post-breach, the difference in the means of the rolling 60-day correlation 8 months pre-breach versus post-breach was not meaningful at 90, 180, and 360-day post-breach periods.
• In regression analysis, use of the number of accessed records, date, data sensitivity, and malicious versus accidental leak as variables failed to yield an R² greater than 16.15% for response variables of 3, 14, 60, and 90-day return differential, excess beta differential, and rolling beta correlation differential, indicating
  that the financial impact on breached companies was highly idiosyncratic.
• Based on returns, the most impacted industries at the 3-day post-breach date were U.S Financial Services, Transportation, and Global Telecom.
  At the 90-day post-breach date, the 3 most impacted industries were U.S. Financial Services, U.S. Healthcare, and Global Telecom.

Fnord666 writes:

The PCI Security Standards Council (PCI SSC) and financial services standards outfit the Accredited Standards Committee X9 have decided to combine forces on personal-identification-number-handling-rules.

Today, both have their own standards, which is a pain for organisations like banks that follow rules set by both organisations. The overlapping standards also make life hard for assessors who may consider an organisation's PCI compliance is not in order if they adhere to the X9 rules.

The Register imagines a few readers don't enjoy having to figure out how to get the two standards running alongside each other.

Hence the decision to consolidate the PCI PIN Security Standard and the X9 TR39 PIN Standard.

Source: The Register

Original Submission

takyon writes:

New exploits related to Meltdown and Spectre have been found, using two CPU cores against each other in cache-based side-channel attacks. The attacks are likely stopped by existing software patches for Meltdown and Spectre, but not necessarily the hardware changes that Intel and others are working on:

When details of the Meltdown and Spectre CPU security vulnerabilities emerged last month, the researchers involved hinted that further exploits may be developed beyond the early proof-of-concept examples. It didn't take long. In a research paper – "MeltdownPrime and SpectrePrime: Automatically-Synthesized Attacks Exploiting Invalidation-Based Coherence Protocols" – out this month, bit boffins from Princeton University and chip designer Nvidia describe variants of Meltdown and Spectre exploit code that can be used to conduct side-channel timing attacks.

In short, the team have discovered new ways for malware to extract sensitive information, such as passwords and other secrets, from a vulnerable computer's memory by exploiting the Meltdown and Spectre design blunders in modern processors. The software mitigations being developed and rolled out to thwart Meltdown and Spectre attacks, which may bring with them performance hits, will likely stop these new exploits.

Crucially, however, changes to the underlying hardware probably will not: that is to say, whatever Intel and its rivals are working on right now to rid their CPU blueprints of these vulnerabilities may not be enough. These fresh exploits attack flaws deeply embedded within modern chip architecture that will be difficult to engineer out. Before you panic: don't. No exploit code has been released.

Intel is now offering $250,000 for side-channel attacks.

Original Submission

"exec" writes:

Astronomers have discovered that our nearest large neighbour, the Andromeda galaxy, is roughly the same size as the Milky Way. It had been thought that Andromeda was two to three times the size of the Milky Way, and that our own galaxy would ultimately be engulfed by our supposedly bigger neighbour. But the latest research, published today, evens the score between the two galaxies.

The study found the weight of the Andromeda is 800 billion times heavier than the sun, on par with the Milky Way. Astrophysicist Dr Prajwal Kafle, from the University of Western Australia node of the International Centre for Radio Astronomy Research, said the study used a new technique to measure the speed required to escape a galaxy. "When a rocket is launched into space, it is thrown out with a speed of 11 km/s to overcome the Earth's gravitational pull," he said. "Our home galaxy, the Milky Way, is over a trillion times heavier than our tiny planet Earth so to escape its gravitational pull we have to launch with a speed of 550 km/s. We used this technique to tie down the mass of Andromeda."

Milky Way ties with neighbor in galactic arms race

-- submitted from IRC

Original Submission

takyon writes:

Austria has one of the highest rates of smoking and youth smoking among high income countries, and that might not be changing anytime soon:

Many Western countries have banned smoking in bars and restaurants, but Austria is bucking that trend. Under a law passed in 2015, Austria was due to bring in a total ban this May, but now its new government of the conservatives and the far-right Freedom Party have scrapped the plans.

The move was spearheaded by the leader of the Freedom Party, Austria's Vice Chancellor Heinz-Christian Strache, himself a smoker, who told parliament last month that it was about freedom of choice. He said restaurants should be free to decide if they want to have smoking sections, where "a citizen has the possibility to decide perhaps to enjoy a cigarette or a pipe or a cigar with their coffee".

The move has horrified Austria's medical establishment. Dr Manfred Neuberger, professor emeritus at the Medical University of Vienna, says it is "a public health disaster".

"The decision is irresponsible. It was a victory for the tobacco industry. The new government made Austria into the ashtray of Europe."

Meanwhile, the country is considering buying more jet fighters, recruiting more police, defunding its public broadcaster, and examining its past.

Original Submission

canopic jug writes:

The Tor Project reports that the Italian Anti-Corruption Authority will now be using Tor as part of its method of collecting tips anonymously.

To comply with these standards, the Italian Anti-Corruption Authority (ANAC), an administrative watchdog, just launched their national online whistleblowing platform using onion services, giving whistleblowers who come forward a secure way to report illegal activity while protecting their identities. Most anti-corruption whistleblowers first speak out anonymously, and only when they know that their concerns are being addressed do they disclose their identities, as reported by Transparency International Italy, an organization advocating uses of Tor in the fight against corruption since 2014.

ANAC software is based on a customized version of GlobaLeaks, a whistleblowing platform by the Hermes Center that integrates Tor natively. GlobaLeaks is expected to be redistributed to all Italian public agencies (~20.000 in total) to comply with Law 179/2017 and in line with the country's recent strategic commitment to open-source software and the reuse of code.

More details are available in Italian.

Source : Italian Anti-Corruption Authority (ANAC) Adopts Onion Services

Original Submission

MrPlow writes:

Submitted via IRC for TheMightyBuzzard

Humans easily outperform machines when it comes to tightening and loosening screw fasteners. The future of manufacturing and recycling may depend on changing that.

In the pantheon of technologies that make our modern society possible, one of the most underappreciated and neglected is the threaded fastener, more commonly known as the screw. This technology emerged at the dawn of the industrial era, when it became possible to make metal gadgets like these on a large scale.

Today, these devices literally hold the world together. Our 21st-century lifestyles would not be possible without them, and they are likely to play an indispensable role for the foreseeable future.

Yet in a world where manufacturing techniques are increasingly automated, there is a problem. The process of screwing and unscrewing is still one in which humans outperform machines. Robotic devices have difficulty locating screws and their sockets and then manipulating screws and screwdrivers effectively.

[...] These researchers are part of a team building robots that can take apart electronic devices, like smartphones, for recycling. The project is called RecyBot, and its goal is to create a high-speed intelligent robotic system for dismantling electronics.

That's a considerable challenge, and one of the biggest headaches is unscrewing. So the team at least have this under their belt. But the same technology could be applied in a wide range of smart factories that have to assemble and disassemble components.

Source: https://www.hardocp.com/news/2018/02/13/humans_screw_much_better_than_killer_robots/

Source: Haptics of Screwing and Unscrewing for its Application in Smart Factories for Disassembly

Original Submission

-- OriginalOwner_ writes:

TheEcoExperts report

So, which country is the most likely to survive climate change?

The answer is Norway, thanks to its low vulnerability score and high readiness score. The nation's Nordic neighbours also fared well, with Finland (3rd), Sweden (4th), Denmark (6th), and Iceland (8th) landing 5 out of the 10 top spots for survivability. So we should all flee to the countries of northern Europe and the north Atlantic to live out our final days should our planet become uninhabitable.

Interestingly the UK and US did not make the top 10, ranking 12th and 15th respectively. Both these nations were named amongst the 10 countries most likely to survive climate change in our 2015 version of this map, but an overall worsening of their vulnerability and readiness scores led to this slip in rank.

Even more surprising is China's position in the ranking--59th. Despite arguably being the world's biggest contributor towards climate change--emitting a massive 9,040 metric tons of CO2 into the atmosphere every year--the country is somewhat sensitive to the effects of a warming planet. This is largely due to the nation's growing population which is putting a strain on China's natural resources and public services. Rather ironically, China's vulnerability to climate change therefore means that they may eventually reap what they sow.

...and who are the biggest losers?

At the other end of the scale, it comes as no surprise that the world's poorest and least developed nations have the lowest chance of surviving climate change. Countries in sub-Saharan Africa fill the bottom 10 spaces for survivability, with Somalia being named the country least likely to survive climate change.

Chad, Eritrea, the Central African Republic, and the Democratic Republic of Congo also fared badly, owing to their unstable governance, poor infrastructure, lack of healthcare, and a scarcity of food and water.

These findings serve as a stark reminder of the need for wealthier, more established countries to support the world's most vulnerable nations. This is particularly true given that many of the world's richest economies contribute the most to climate change but are in fact the least likely to be affected by it.

Original Submission