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upstart on IRC brings us this submission from chromas:

The planet's prodigious poo problem

How much poo is generated by the world’s farms?

Recent research has estimated that by 2030, the planet will be generating at least 5bn tonnes of poo each year, with the vast majority being deposited by livestock. With 80% of farms in the Netherlands already producing more cow dung than they can legally use as fertiliser, and China resorting to drastic measures to try to reduce the amount of manure being discharged into rivers, scientists say this is a major environment and health challenge.

“It’s a huge problem,” says Joe Brown, professor of environmental engineering at Georgia Institute of Technology. “Animal waste is going up because as populations and wealth increase, there’s a bigger demand for protein. But while we’ve seen lots of initiatives to safely manage human waste, nobody is talking about this.” [...]

What are the knock-on environmental risks?

Because most first world farming systems are highly concentrated, industrial operations, this produces very concentrated streams of waste. Unless these are dealt with rapidly, they can pollute the air with large amounts of harmful gases such as ammonia, nitrous oxide and hydrogen sulphide.

Inhaling these toxic fumes can be lethal in large quantities, and studies have repeatedly shown that people who live near industrial farms have a much greater risk of chronic asthma, respiratory irritation, immune suppression, and even mood disorders.

Water pollution and climate change are also issues.

[Ed's notes: My first thoughts are on how this might be mirroring Victorian-era poolution in cities before cars took over, and from there to how many other times too much poo from too many nearby animals has deleteriously affected the humans who were encouraging the growth of the problem. Feel free to fling other examples at me if you can think of them! -- FP]

Original Submission

An Anonymous Coward writes:

Free speech has potentially been taken down another peg in NZ with a woman arrested for a Facebook post about the Christchurch shootings. The woman has been arrested on suspicion of "inciting racial disharmony" after a message was posted to her Facebook page. She faces a maximum penalty of three months’ imprisonment or a NZ$7000 fine and living in a society that condemns free speech. However, given the recent ruling in Australia that 'Muslim' is not a 'race' she may get off given that the law she is accused of breaking is of one who “publishes or distributes written matter which is threatening, abusive, or insulting” to other people . This means that it may very well be legal at this time to insult people of a specific religion.

Decades ago they relied on neighbors to find subversives; now they just check social media.

[Ed.: The above is a paraphrase of the linked-to story, not a direct quote, and with submitter's editorialising left in. -- FP (honouring people's right to free speech ;-) )]

Also covered by the NZ Herald.

Original Submission

karthika qpt suggested a story:

Fathers of the Deep Learning Revolution Receive ACM A.M. Turing Award:

ACM, the Association for Computing Machinery, today named Yoshua Bengio, Geoffrey Hinton, and Yann LeCun recipients of the 2018 ACM A.M. Turing Award for conceptual and engineering breakthroughs that have made deep neural networks a critical component of computing. Bengio is Professor at the University of Montreal and Scientific Director at Mila, Quebec’s Artificial Intelligence Institute; Hinton is VP and Engineering Fellow of Google, Chief Scientific Adviser of The Vector Institute, and University Professor Emeritus at the University of Toronto; and LeCun is Professor at New York University and VP and Chief AI Scientist, Facebook.

Working independently and together, Hinton, LeCun and Bengio developed conceptual foundations for the field, identified surprising phenomena through experiments, and contributed engineering advances that demonstrated the practical advantages of deep neural networks. In recent years, deep learning methods have been responsible for astonishing breakthroughs in computer vision, speech recognition, natural language processing, and robotics—among other applications.

takyon writes:

Rocket Lab launches dedicated DARPA mission on Electron

Rocket Lab is aiming for a rapid launch cadence in 2019, and begun that campaign with the first Electron launch of the year. The window to launch the R3D2 mission for DARPA was to open on Sunday at 22:30 UTC for four hours. However, a scrub was called for at least 48 hours due to a "video transmitter 13dB down with low performance" – while forecasted high winds moved the launch two days to the right, to Thursday. That attempt proved successful with an ontime launch.

The Radio Frequency Risk Reduction Deployment Demonstration satellite is a technology demonstration mission for the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, the United States government's military technology development agency. The mission was the first Electron launch dedicated to a single satellite on board, lofting the 150 kg spacecraft into a circular orbit, inclined 39.5 degrees, at an altitude of 425 km.

R3D2's mission is to qualify a prototype membrane reflect-array antenna, designed to improve radio communications in small spacecraft. On board is a compacted Kapton membrane antenna built by MMA Design, which deploys to 2.25 meters in diameter once in orbit.

DARPA hopes R3D2 will validate concepts for space-based internet as well as communications capabilities for the United States Department of Defense. Radio systems aboard R3D2 were built by Trident Systems, and the payload is mounted on a spacecraft bus built by Blue Canyon Tech. Northrop Grumman is the mission's prime contractor and integrator.

Also at SpaceFlight Insider and The Verge.

Previously: Rocket Lab Mission for NASA Successfully Launches 13 CubeSats

Original Submission

MrPlow writes:

Submitted via IRC for SoyCow1984

Office Depot and a partner company tricked customers into buying unneeded tech support services by offering PC scans that gave fake results, according to the Federal Trade Commission. Consumers paid up to $300 each for unnecessary services.

The FTC yesterday announced that Office Depot and its software supplier, Support.com, have agreed to pay a total of $35 million in settlements with the agency. Office Depot agreed to pay $25 million while Support.com will pay the other $10 million. The FTC said it intends to use the money to provide refunds to wronged consumers.

Between 2009 and 2016, Office Depot and OfficeMax offered computer scans inside their stores using a "PC Health Check" software application created and licensed by Support.com.

"Defendants bilked unsuspecting consumers out of tens of millions of dollars from their use of the PC Health Check program to sell costly diagnostic and repair services," the FTC alleged in a complaint that accuses both companies of violating the FTC Act's prohibition against deceptive practices. As part of the settlements, neither company admitted or denied the FTC's allegations.

The FTC filed its complaint against the companies in US District Court for the Southern District of Florida, while at the same time unveiling the settlements with each company.

Source: https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2019/03/office-depot-tricked-people-into-buying-pc-support-with-fake-virus-scans/

Original Submission

martyb writes:

A bad Bout of Flu Triggers 'Taste Bud Cells' to Grow in the Lungs:

The discovery of these seemingly out-of-place sensing cells may lend insight into possibilities for protecting lung function in people who experience severe influenza infections.

Most people who weather an infection with influenza fully recover after a week or two. But for some, a severe case of the flu can actually reshape the architecture of their lungs and forever compromise their respiratory function.

With a surprising new finding, researchers from Penn have identified what they believe to be a major feature of this remodeling process. When the team examined the lungs of mice after a severe bout with flu, they found cells virtually identical to those found in taste buds. Tracing the origin of these “taste bud cells,” also referred to as solitary chemosensory cells or tuft cells, the scientists found they arose from the same lineage of cells as those known to cause detrimental lung remodeling. With further study, the discovery may lend insight into possibilities for protecting lung function in people who experience severe influenza infections.

“It was just really weird to see, because these cells are not in the lung at baseline,” says senior author and team leader Andrew E. Vaughan, a biologist in Penn’s School of Veterinary Medicine. “The closest they are normally is in the trachea. What we did was show where they’re coming from and how this same rare cell type that gives you all this maladaptive remodeling of the lung after flu is also the source of these ectopic tuft cells.”

martyb writes:

NASA Will Pay You $19,000 to Stay in Bed -- and be Spun in a Centrifuge:

Like to lounge in bed? We might have your dream job.

NASA and the European Space Agency will pay you $19,000 to lie in bed for two months. Two months! That's a lot of Netflix.

The prolonged bed rest is part of a study that launched this week into the effects of weightlessness on the human body. Phase 2 will be conducted by the German Aerospace Center (DLR) from September through December in Cologne, Germany.

"We are interested in how to maintain the health and performance of man -- in space and on Earth," reads a translated DLR website for the project. "Especially in extreme conditions, such as in weightlessness in space, this is a challenge." If astronauts are to live for long periods in space, or on the moon and Mars, science needs effective measures to counteract bone and muscle atrophy.

For the next phase of the Agbresa (Artificial Gravity Bed Rest Study), the DLR seeks 12 men and 12 women who will spend their days and nights in beds angled downward by 6 degrees, propped up with their feet at an incline above their heads, with one shoulder touching the mattress at all times. This position reduces blood flow to the extremities, like astronauts in space experience.

[...] Not everyone qualifies though. Participants are required to speak German and be between 24 and 55 and healthy. In addition to the 60 days required for bed rest, participants will stay an additional 29 days for acclimation and supervised recovery involving stretching, massage and physiotherapy.

When lying down on the job is a good thing.

Original Submission

martyb writes:

Twitter may Tag Rule-Breaking Trump Tweets:

Twitter said Thursday it could start tagging tweets from newsworthy figures such as US President Donald Trump that break its rules, while stopping short of deleting them.

The one-to-many messaging platform used extensively by Trump to fire off comments, some of them inflammatory, said it is exploring ways to add context to tweets considered to be of legitimate public interest but which violate its terms of service.

"Twitter is exploring ways to provide more context around tweets that violate our rules, but are newsworthy and in the legitimate public interest," the company said in an emailed statement.

[...]Twitter's trust and safety chief Vijaya Gadde [...] said during an on-stage interview at a Washington Post technology forum in San Francisco that Twitter was looking at ways to "put some context around it so people are aware that that content is actually a violation of our rules and it is serving a particular purpose in remaining on the platform."

Tweets that go too far, such as threatening someone with violence, would be removed no matter who posts them, according to Gadde.

The rules don't have to be followed if you are "newsworthy", but the rest of us have to abide by them. Got it.

Original Submission

RandomFactor writes:

In what could potentially be one of the most, or least, significant actions of his term in office, President Trump Tuesday signed an Executive Order requiring federal agencies to strengthen critical infrastructure against ElectroMagnetic Pulse (EMP) attacks.

EMPs occur for a variety of natural and man-made reasons including, most notably, Nuclear Explosions and Coronal Mass Ejections (CMEs), either of which could potentially take out entire sections of the country's electrical grid and other infrastructure and capabilities, requiring require years or decades to recover from.

Members and supporters of the decommissioned US Commission to Assess the Threat to the United States from Electromagnetic Pulse have long warned of the possibility of an EMP attack, with some individuals, such as Peter Pry, who previously led the congressional EMP commission, asserting that an EMP attack on America could kill off 90% of the US population.

This is because a man-made EMP has the advantage of being highly asymmetrical. A small country able to pull one off would cause potentially massive disruption to a large tech dependent country such as the United States.

Past EMP related coverage here, here and here

Original Submission

saturnalia0 writes:

Scientists first noticed in the 1970s that some frog populations were declining quickly; by the 1980s, some species appeared to be extinct. The losses were puzzling, because the frogs were living in pristine habitats, unharmed by pollution or deforestation.

In the late 1990s, researchers discovered that frogs in both Australia and Panama were infected with a deadly fungus, which they named Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis — Bd, for short.

The fungus turned up in other countries, but studies of its DNA suggest that Bd originated on the Korean Peninsula. In Asia, amphibians seem impervious to Bd, but when it got to other parts of the world — probably via the international trade in pet amphibians — the pathogen reached hundreds of vulnerable species.

Amphibians are infected with Bd by contact with other animals or by spores floating in the water. The fungus invades skin cells and multiplies. An infected frog’s skin will start to peel away as the animal grows sluggish. Before it dies, a frog may manage to hop its way to a new stream or pond, spreading the fungus further.

In 2007, researchers speculated that Bd might be responsible for all known declines of frogs that had no other apparent cause — about 200 species. For the most part, however, scientists studied Bd at the local level, looking at its impacts on particular species in particular places.

[...]On Thursday, 41 scientists published the first worldwide analysis of a fungal outbreak that’s been wiping out frogs for decades. The devastation turns out to be far worse than anyone had previously realized.

Writing in the journal Science, the researchers conclude that populations of more than 500 species of amphibians have declined significantly because of the outbreak — including at least 90 species presumed to have gone extinct. The figure is more than twice as large as earlier estimates.

Story https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/28/science/frogs-fungus-bd.html
Original article http://science.sciencemag.org/content/363/6434/1459

Original Submission

An Anonymous Coward writes:

A major Greenland glacier that was one of the fastest shrinking ice and snow masses on Earth is growing again, a new NASA study finds.

The Jakobshavn (YA-cob-shawv-en) glacier around 2012 was retreating about 1.8 miles (3 kilometers) and thinning nearly 130 feet (almost 40 meters) annually. But it started growing again at about the same rate in the past two years, according to a study in Monday’s Nature Geoscience . Study authors and outside scientists think this is temporary.

“That was kind of a surprise. We kind of got used to a runaway system,” said Geological Survey of Denmark and Greenland ice and climate scientist Jason Box. “The good news is that it’s a reminder that it’s not necessarily going that fast. But it is going.”

Box, who wasn’t part of the study, said Jakobshavn is “arguably the most important Greenland glacier because it discharges the most ice in the northern hemisphere. For all of Greenland, it is king.”

DannyB writes:

Huawei's equipment poses 'significant' security risks, UK says:

The U.K. government warned on Thursday Huawei's telecommunications equipment raises "significant" security issues, posing a possible setback to the Chinese tech firm as it looks to build out 5G networks.

In 46-page report evaluating Huawei's security risks, British officials stopped short of calling for a ban of Huawei's 5G telecommunications equipment. But the assessment cited "underlying defects" in the company's software engineering and cybersecurity processes, citing "significantly increased risk to U.K. operators."

The findings give weight to warnings from U.S. officials who have argued Huawei's networking equipment could be used for espionage by the Chinese government. Huawei has repeatedly said it does not pose any risk and insists it would not share customer data with Beijing.

In a statement Thursday, Huawei said it takes the U.K. government's findings "very seriously."

"The issues identified in the OB (oversight board) report provide vital input for the ongoing transformation of our software engineering capabilities," a Huawei spokesperson said.

Other links:
Huawei Equipment Has Major Security Flaws, U.K. Says
Huawei's Perception Problem Deepens as U.K. Spies Identify Security Risks

So don't buy Huawei telecom equipment. Buy only US made telecom equipment. Because the NSA would never put bugs in for spying.

Original Submission

jas writes:

A critical vulnerability in MikroTik’s RouterOS handling of IPv6 packets allows for “remote, unauthenticated denial of service,” according to security researcher Marek Isalski.

[...]The vulnerability to be disclosed is designated as CVE-2018-19299, and is a "larger problem with MikroTik RouterOS's handling of IPv6 packets" than the related CVE-2018-19298, which relates to IPv6 Neighbor Discovery Protocol exhaustion.

[...]According to a post on MikroTik’s user forum, the new vulnerability is “a memory exhaustion issue. You send a v6 packet formed in a certain way to a Mikrotik router and the kernel leaks a bit of memory. When memory runs out the router crashes, I assume until the watchdog reboots it. There is no way to firewall as whatever this characteristic is that causes the problem can be set with any v6 packet.”

Presently, the only mitigation is to completely disable IPv6 in RouterOS.

https://www.techrepublic.com/article/unpatched-vulnerability-in-mikrotik-routeros-enables-easily-exploitable-denial-of-service-attack/

Original Submission

RandomFactor writes:

Yesterday [March 26] the FTC (Federal Trade Comission) announced that it had won court orders shutting down four separate robocall "Operations Responsible for Billions of Illegal Robocalls"

Settlements were obtained against

    NetDotSolutions
    Higher Goals Marketing
    Veterans of America
    PointBreak Media

The judgements include multimillion dollar penalties and require the various entities to stop all robocalling and some other operations.

The calls you should see less of that these companies provided include

auto warranties, debt-relief services, home security systems, fake charities, and Google search results services

No indication if this includes those medical back brace insurance scam calls that seem to have taken over lately, but here is hoping.

More coverage here

Original Submission

takyon writes:

BBC removes its shows from Google's Podcasts app

If you search for BBC programs on the Google Podcasts app or through Assistant, you might get a handful of results at most -- or none at all -- instead of the dozens you'd usually get in the past. The broadcaster has pulled its offerings from the app after the tech giant altered its search function to direct viewers to its own service instead of BBC Sounds and other third-party services.

[...] [Perhaps] the main reason why the broadcaster chose to abandon the app is somewhere near the bottom of [BBC's Distribution and Business Development Director Kiera Clifton's] post, particularly the part where he talks about audience data. By directing users to its own app, Google is depriving the BBC of information on what potential listeners are interested in. The broadcaster uses that data to determine what's popular or trending, so it can create more programs of a similar nature. It could also use that information to surface similar shows for a user and to make sure it doesn't have gaps in its coverage.

Google is looking for a solution, so expect more user tracking.

Also at Android Authority.

Related: Google Podcasts App Launches, Years After It Canceled a Similar App
Google Podcasts Creator Program Aims to Increase Diversity in Podcasting

Original Submission