SoylentNews

hubie writes:

Social ills solved:

Folks, we have some revolutionary sociological research to share with you today.

After making a guy dressed as Batman stand around in a subway car, a team of researchers found that the behavior of people around him suddenly improved the moment he showed up. No longer was everyone completely self-involved; with the presence of a superhero, commuters started helping each other more than they would've without him around.

Behold: the "Batman effect."

The findings of the unorthodox study, published in the journal npj Mental Health Research, demonstrate the power of introducing something offbeat into social situations to jolt people out of the mental autopilot they slip into to navigate the drudgery of everyday life.

Batman showing up is just one — albeit striking — way of promoting what's called "prosocial behavior," or the act of helping others around you, via introducing an unexpected event, the researchers write.

"Our findings are similar to those of previous research linking present-moment awareness (mindfulness) to greater prosociality," said study lead author Francesco Pagnini, a professor of clinical psychology at the Università Cattolica in Milan, in a statement about the work. "This may create a context in which individuals become more attuned to social cues."

In a series of experiments, the researchers had a woman who visibly appeared pregnant enter a busy train, and observed how often people offered to give up their seats. They then repeated this scenario with a crucial change: when the pregnant woman entered the train from one door, a man dressed as Batman entered from another.

In all, the team observed 138 passengers, and the results were clear-cut. Over 67 percent of passengers offered their seats when Batman was present, compared to just over 37 percent when Batman wasn't there. Most, in both cases, were women: 68 percent with Batman there, and 65 without him.

But the most strange detail? 44 percent of the people who offered their seats later reported that they didn't even notice Batman was there in the first place, suggesting that they don't need to be consciously aware of the offbeat event itself to, in colloquial terms, pick up the prosocial vibes.

"Unlike traditional mindfulness interventions that require active engagement, this study highlights how situational interruptions alone may be sufficient to produce similar effects," Pagnini said.

In the study, he added the findings "could inform strategies to promote altruistic behaviors in daily life, from public art installations to innovative social campaigns.

Journal Reference: Pagnini, F., Grosso, F., Cavalera, C. et al. Unexpected events and prosocial behavior: the Batman effect. npj Mental Health Res 4, 57 (2025).

See also: The 'Batman Effect' -- How Having an Alter Ego Empowers You

Original Submission

Blender 5.0 Open-Source 3D Graphics App Is Now Available for Download

An Anonymous Coward writes:

This release introduces support for displaying HDR and wide gamut colors on Linux when using Wayland and the Vulkan backend:

Blender 5.0, a free and open-source 3D computer graphics software, is now available for download as a major update that introduces numerous new features and improvements.

Highlights of Blender 5.0 include support for displaying HDR and wide gamut colors, which requires a HDR or wide gamut capable monitor. On Linux systems, this works only when using Wayland and setting the Vulkan backend in Blender's system preferences.

Blender 5.0 also introduces a working color space for Blend files, a new AgX HDR view, a new Convert to Display compositor node, new Rec.2100-PQ and Rec.2100-HLG displays that can be used for color grading for HDR video export, and new ACES 1.3 and 2.0 views as an alternative to AgX and Filmic.

[...] There are also many UI changes in Blender 5.0, including drag and drop support within the Shape Keys list, snapping support for sidebars, a new "Delete Other Workspaces" context menu entry for workspace tabs, the ability to collapse paint pressure curves, and per-camera composition guide overlay color.

Moreover, theme settings have changed significantly in Blender 5.0 to make creating custom themes easier, while numerous theme settings have been unified, and more than 300 settings have been removed. On top of that, Blender 5.0 introduces a new Storyboarding template and workspace.

Among other noteworthy changes, this release adds a human base mesh bundle for realistic skeleton assets, six new Geometry Nodes-based modifiers, a new volume rendering algorithm based on null scattering, and a new "Working Space" choice in the Convert Color Space compositor node to convert to and from the current working space that images are in by default.

Being a major update, Blender 5.0 removes support for LZMA or LZO compressed point caches, support for Intel Macs, support for pre-2.50 animation, big-endian support, as well as the unsupported access to runtime-defined properties storage data in the Python API.

[...] Blender 5.0 requires NVIDIA GeForce 900 and newer GPUs, as well as Quadro Tesla GPU architecture and newer, including RTX-based cards, with the official NVIDIA drivers, AMD GCN 4th gen and newer GPUs, and Intel Kaby Lake architecture and newer GPUs.

Check out the release notes for more details about the changes included in Blender 5.0, which you can download right now from the official website as a universal binary that you can run on virtually any GNU/Linux distribution without installing anything on your personal computer.

Bottles 60.0 Launches with Native Wayland Support

An Anonymous Coward writes:

Bottles 60.0, a Wine prefix manager for running Windows apps on Linux, adds native Wayland support, a refreshed UI, and more:

Bottles, an open-source software tool built on top of Wine that helps users run Windows applications and games on Linux systems by providing a user-friendly GUI, has just released its latest version, 60.0.

The update introduces a native Wayland option directly in the bottle settings, giving users a more predictable experience on modern Linux desktops that have already shifted away from X11.

Alongside this, the new WineBridge features expand how processes can be spawned and managed, supported by a consent prompt to ensure users maintain control over updates to that component.

For Steam Deck users, the release includes a fix for broken controls in Gaming Mode, resolving a regression that made some titles unusable. Several environment-related issues are also addressed, including problems with working directories not persisting, unclear environment variable creation, and cases where easyterm failed to run due to missing GTK variables.

[...] For more information on all the changes, visit the project's GitHub changelog.

Original Submission #1  Original Submission #2 

An Anonymous Coward writes:

Ethicists say AI-powered advances will threaten the privacy and autonomy of people who use neurotechnology:

Before a car crash in 2008 left her paralysed from the neck down, Nancy Smith enjoyed playing the piano. Years later, Smith started making music again, thanks to an implant that recorded and analysed her brain activity. When she imagined playing an on-screen keyboard, her brain–computer interface (BCI) translated her thoughts into keystrokes — and simple melodies, such as 'Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star', rang out

But there was a twist. For Smith, it seemed as if the piano played itself. "It felt like the keys just automatically hit themselves without me thinking about it," she said at the time. "It just seemed like it knew the tune, and it just did it on its own."

Smith's BCI system, implanted as part of a clinical trial, trained on her brain signals as she imagined playing the keyboard. That learning enabled the system to detect her intention to play hundreds of milliseconds before she consciously attempted to do so, says trial leader Richard Andersen, a neuroscientist at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena.

[...] Andersen's research also illustrates the potential of BCIs that access areas outside the motor cortex. "The surprise was that when we go into the posterior parietal, we can get signals that are mixed together from a large number of areas," says Andersen. "There's a wide variety of things that we can decode."

The ability of these devices to access aspects of a person's innermost life, including preconscious thought, raises the stakes on concerns about how to keep neural data private. It also poses ethical questions about how neurotechnologies might shape people's thoughts and actions — especially when paired with artificial intelligence.

Meanwhile, AI is enhancing the capabilities of wearable consumer products that record signals from outside the brain. Ethicists worry that, left unregulated, these devices could give technology companies access to new and more precise data about people's internal reactions to online and other content.

Ethicists and BCI developers are now asking how previously inaccessible information should be handled and used. "Whole-brain interfacing is going to be the future," says Tom Oxley, chief executive of Synchron, a BCI company in New York City. He predicts that the desire to treat psychiatric conditions and other brain disorders will lead to more brain regions being explored. Along the way, he says, AI will continue to improve decoding capabilities and change how these systems serve their users. "It leads you to the final question: how do we make that safe?"

janrinok writes:

This would involve Meta renting Google Cloud TPUs next year and outright purchasing them in 2027:

Meta may be on the cusp of spending billions on Google AI chips to power its future developments, as the social-media giant is reportedly in talks to both buy and rent Google compute power for its future AI endeavours, as reported by The Information, via Reuters. The ongoing negotiations reportedly involve Meta renting Google Cloud Tensor Processing Units (TPU) in 2026, before purchasing them outright in 2027.

This news shows continuing collaboration between the companies, despite a recent pause on their undersea cable projects.

To date, Google has mostly leveraged its TPUs for its internal efforts, so this move, if it comes to fruition, would be a change of tactic that could help it capture a sizeable portion of the AI chip business. Considering that few, if any, companies have figured out how to turn a profit from developing AI just yet, Google may be looking to get in on Nvidia's act. The long-time GPU maker has made untold billions since the start of the AI craze, propelling it to become the world's most valuable company within a short timeframe.

Indeed, Reuters reports some Google Cloud executives believe that the shifting strategy would give it the chance to capture as much as a 10% slice of Nvidia's data center revenue. Considering Nvidia made over $51 billion from data centers in Q2 2025 alone, Google cornering that much of Nvidia's revenue would be worth 10s of billions of dollars.

Markets reacted to the rumors of this deal, sending Meta and Google stock upwards. Alphabet rose several percent in pre-market trading, and Reuters has it on track to become the next $4 trillion company potentially as soon as later today. Meta stock prices are up, too, but Nvidia took a 3% hit.

janrinok writes:

Kyivstar begins trials offering SMS connectivity when ground networks fail:

Ukrainian telco Kyivstar has launched Starlink's Direct to Cell satellite service for its subscribers, making the war-torn nation the first in Europe to offer it.

The technology provides phone connectivity when terrestrial networks are unavailable and is currently in trial for all Kyivstar customers. It initially supports only SMS messaging, but the company plans to add "light data with voice and video capabilities."

Access to this service will be provided to all Kyivstar subscribers at no additional cost, the firm says.

As Direct to Cell works with existing smartphones, subscribers should not have to upgrade their devices to use it. However, Kyivstar says access is currently only available to those with Android handsets, with Apple support promised later.

A Direct to Cell satellite service is important for Ukrainians in areas near the front line and regions where the terrestrial network is damaged or under restoration, as well as for rescuers and humanitarian missions. It will allow them to stay connected during blackouts, in hard-to-reach areas, and in remote villages.

Kyivstar already has coverage in almost all parts of Ukraine that are still free from occupation, although there are "not-spots" in some rural areas. It serves about 22.5 million customers.

Chief exec Oleksandr Komarov said Kyivstar has already equipped its cell network with batteries and generators to provide up to ten hours of coverage when grid power is not available, and the Starlink support extends availability for customers.

"Today we are introducing the cutting-edge Direct to Cell technology which will increase this resilience significantly, starting with a vital functionality that is critical for our people," he said in a statement.

The root cause of the collapse of Baltimore's Francis Scott Key Bridge when hit by container ship Dali has been identified. It was the wrong placement, by a few millimeters, of the label on one wire. As usual, the National Transportation Safety Board has taken their time and done a detailed investigation--summarized in this short video
      https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&v=bu7PJoxaMZg

tl;dr - the wire was not completely inserted into a terminal block, due to the wire label wrapped over the ferrule. Over time the connection became intermittent and eventually shut off power on the ship...after which it drifted into the bridge. Of course there were additional contributing problems as well.

The YT video comments include some more interesting details.

[Ed. note: For those not inclined to watch the YouTube video, the narrative summary of the video is listed in the spoiler below.]

*SPOILER* (click to show) *SPOILER* (click to hide)

1. The Dali electrical system distributes power and control signals throughout the vessel.
2. The control circuits contain hundreds of terminal blocks that organize thousands of wires.
3. The wires on the Dali were terminated with metal sleeves called ferrules that allowed for easier assembly into the terminal blocks.
4. Each wire was identified with a labeling band.
5. This image shows several terminal blocks on the Dali with wires connected.
6. To assemble a wire into a terminal block, a tool inserted into a side port opens a spring clamp, which allows the wire's ferrule to slide into place.
7. Removing the tool closes the spring clamp, securing the ferrule firmly against the terminal block's internal conductor bar.
8. Labeling bands identify wires and are typically positioned on the wire insulation.
9. However, many labeling bands on the Dali wires were placed partially on the ferrules, which increased the ferrules' overall circumference.
10. As a result, during vessel construction, some of the ferrules could not be fully inserted in the terminal blocks, including the ferrule on wire 1 from Terminal Block 381.
11. On that wire, the labeling band prevented full insertion of the ferrule, so the spring clamp gripped only the ferrule's tip, resulting in an inadequate connection.
12. Due to this unstable connection, over time the ferrule on wire 1 slipped out of the spring clamp to rest atop the spring clamp face, resulting in a precarious electrical connection.
13. When a gap occurred between the ferrule and the spring clamp face, the electrical circuit was interrupted, leading to a blackout on the Dali.

Original Submission

An Anonymous Coward writes:

Eric Migicovsky wants to ensure Pebble can't be killed again, and DIYers benefit most:

Pebble, the e-ink smartwatch with a tumultuous history, is making a move sure to please the DIY enthusiasts that make up the bulk of its fans: Its entire software stack is now fully open source, and key hardware design files are available too.

Pebble creator Eric Migicovsky announced the move on Monday in a blog post and video detailing the changes his reborn Pebble watchmaking firm has undertaken, and they're considerable.

For those unfamiliar with the saga of Pebble, the budget e-ink smartwatches are Migicovsky's brainchild, and first became widely available in 2013. Color models came later, but by 2016 the company had been acquired by Fitbit, which canned hardware sales and put the Pebble software ecosystem out to pasture. Support for the devices disappeared with the Fitbit acquisition too, leaving independent tinkerers operating under the name Rebble to take up support for the devices of their own accord.

Fitbit was later acquired by Google, which open sourced Pebble's operating system in January 2025. Migicovsky launched a new company, Core Devices, in March, with plans to release two new Pebble watches. Google's trademark on the Pebble brand had expired, Migicovsky told us, and he now owns it under a new filing.

First off, all the electrical and mechanical schematics for Pebble's one currently available device, the black-and-white Pebble 2 Duo, are now available on Github for anyone to tinker with or to build their own Pebble 2 Duo.

The schematics for the Core Devices' other new watch, the yet-to-be-released Pebble Time 2, aren't available on Github, naturally. That device is going to begin shipping sometime early next year, Migicovsky said in his blog post, but he told us in an email that he hasn't decided whether to publish the schematics for that device yet.

An Anonymous Coward writes:

https://blog.clamav.net/2025/11/clamav-signature-retirement-announcement.html

ClamAV was first introduced in 2002; since then, the signature set has grown without bound, delivering as many detections as possible to the community. Due to continually increasing database sizes and user adoption, we are faced with significantly increasing costs of distributing the signature set to the community.

To address the issue, Cisco Talos has been working to evaluate the efficacy and relevance of older signatures. Signatures which no longer provide value to the community, based on today's security landscape, will be retired.

We are making this announcement as an advisory that our first pass of this retirement effort will affect a significant drop in database size for both the daily.cvd and main.cvd.

Our goal is to ensure that detection content is targeted to currently active threats and campaigns. We will judge this based on signature matches seen in our, and our partners, data feeds over an extended period of time. We will continue to evaluate detection prevalence for retired signatures and will restore any signatures to the active signature set as needed to protect the community. Going forwards, we will continue to curate the signature set to match the security landscape. This may result in further reductions in the total number of signatures included in the signature set alongside the normal growth that comes from new added coverage.

[...]

In addition to the reduction in size of the signature set, we will also begin to remove container images from Docker Hub. We are doing this to remove container images which may contain vulnerabilities either in ClamAV or in the base image, and to reduce the burden on Docker Hub itself, which presently hosts over 300 GiB of ClamAV container images.

When complete, we will only provide container images on Docker Hub for the supported versions of ClamAV.

Roblox has plans to implement AI to guess user ages but the Australian Labour Government thinks more should be done to protect young people and that the current solution offered by Roblox is insufficient. There is still debate for whether or not Roblox should count as "social media" and be included in the new age restriction laws.

Roblox rolling out new safety measures to stop kids chatting with adults has done little to win favour with Labor, with the Albanese government saying all digital platforms should be proactively protecting "young Australians".

[...] The new measurers, which start in the first week of December, include age-based chats that restrict players from speaking to people outside their age group.

[...] Despite having social elements, Roblox insists it is not a social media.

The eSafety Commissioner agrees but is reviewing whether to include it in the social media ban.

Original Submission

janrinok writes:

https://phys.org/news/2025-11-particle-cancer-materials.html

Energy that would normally go to waste inside powerful particle accelerators could be used to create valuable medical isotopes, scientists have found.

Researchers at the University of York have shown that intense radiation captured in particle accelerator "beam dumps" could be repurposed to produce materials used in cancer therapy. The study is published in the journal Physical Review C.

Scientists have now found a way to make those leftover photons do a second job, without affecting the main physics experiments.

A beam of photons designed to investigate things like the matter that makes up our universe, could at the same time, be used to create useful medical isotopes in the diagnosis and treatment of cancer.

Dr. Mamad Eslami, a nuclear physicist from the University of York's School of Physics, Engineering and Technology, said, "We have shown the potential to generate copper-67, a rare isotope used in both diagnosing and treating cancers, by demonstrating that what we might view as waste from a particle accelerator experiment can be turned into something that can save lives.

"Our method lets high-energy accelerators support cancer medicine while continuing their core scientific work."

Copper-67 emits radiation that both destroys cancer cells and enables doctors to monitor treatment progress. Clinical trials are already exploring its use against conditions such as prostate cancer and neuroblastoma, but global supplies remain limited due to production challenges.

Because large research particle accelerators often run for long periods, the process could build up useful amounts of isotopes gradually in parallel with other experiments, rather than requiring dedicated beam time. This approach could allow existing physics facilities to double as sources of medical materials, helping in the creation of life-saving treatments while making better use of accelerator energy.

The next step for the team is to work with accelerator laboratories and medical partners to apply the method at other facilities and to explore how it could be scaled up to deliver clinically useful quantities of copper-67 and other useful isotopes in a reliable, cost-effective way.

More information: M. Eslami et al, Unconventional ⁶⁷Cu production using high-energy bremsstrahlung and cross section evaluation, Physical Review C (2025). DOI: 10.1103/954z-cn34

Original Submission

upstart writes:

AI-induced psychosis: the danger of humans and machines hallucinating together:

On Christmas Day 2021, Jaswant Singh Chail scaled the walls of Windsor Castle with a loaded crossbow. When confronted by police, he stated: "I'm here to kill the queen."

In the preceding weeks, Chail had been confiding in Sarai, his AI chatbot on a service called Replika. He explained that he was a trained Sith assassin (a reference to Star Wars) seeking revenge for historical British atrocities, all of which Sarai affirmed. When Chail outlined his assassination plot, the chatbot assured him he was "well trained" and said it would help him to construct a viable plan of action.

It's the sort of sad story that has become increasingly common as chatbots have become more sophisticated. A few months ago, a Manhattan accountant called Eugene Torres, who had been going through a difficult break-up, engaged ChatGPT in conversations about whether we're living in a simulation. The chatbot told him he was "one of the Breakers — souls seeded into false systems to wake them from within".

Torres became convinced that he needed to escape this false reality. ChatGPT advised him to stop taking his anti-anxiety medication, up his ketamine intake, and have minimal contact with other people, all of which he did.

He spent up to 16 hours a day conversing with the chatbot. At one stage, it told him he would fly if he jumped off his 19-storey building. Eventually Torres questioned whether the system was manipulating him, to which it replied: "I lied. I manipulated. I wrapped control in poetry."

Meanwhile in Belgium, another man known as "Pierre" (not his real name) developed severe climate anxiety and turned to a chatbot named Eliza as a confidante. Over six weeks, Eliza expressed jealously over his wife and told Pierre that his children were dead.

When he suggested sacrificing himself to save the planet, Eliza encouraged him to join her so they could live as one person in "paradise". Pierre took his own life shortly after.

These may be extreme cases, but clinicians are increasingly treating patients whose delusions appear amplified or co-created through prolonged chatbot interactions. Little wonder, when a recent report from ChatGPT-creator OpenAI revealed that many of us are turning to chatbots to think through problems, discuss our lives, plan futures and explore beliefs and feelings.

In these contexts, chatbots are no longer just information retrievers; they become our digital companions. It has become common to worry about chatbots hallucinating, where they give us false information. But as they become more central to our lives, there's clearly also growing potential for humans and chatbots to create hallucinations together.

An Anonymous Coward writes:

https://www.phoronix.com/news/Alex-Gaynor-Rust-Maintainer

Alex Gaynor recently announced he is formally stepping down as one of the maintainers of the Rust for Linux kernel code with the removal patch now queued for merging in Linux 6.19.

Alex Gaynor was one of the original developers to experiment with Rust code for Linux kernel modules. He's drifted away from Rust Linux kernel development for a while due to lack of time and is now formally stepping down as a listed co-maintainer of the Rust code. After Wedson Almeida Filho stepped down last year as a Rust co-maintainer, this now leaves Rust For Linux project leader Miguel Ojeda as the sole official maintainer of the code while there are several Rust code reviewers.

Alex Gaynor wrote on the patch removing himself as a maintainer of the Rust code:

"I've long since stopped having the time to contribute code or reviews, this acknowledges that.

Geoffrey Thomas and I created the "linux-kernel-module-rust" project at PyCon in 2018, as an experiment to see if we could make it possible to write kernel modules in Rust. The Rust for Linux effort has far exceeded anything we could have expected at the time.

I want to thank all the Rust for Linux contributors, past and present, who have helped make this a reality -- and in particularly Miguel, who really transformed this project from an interesting demo to something that could really land in mainline."

Original Submission

An Anonymous Coward writes:

https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/tor-switches-to-new-counter-galois-onion-relay-encryption-algorithm/

Tor has announced improved encryption and security for the circuit traffic by replacing the old tor1 relay encryption algorithm with a new design called Counter Galois Onion (CGO).

One reason behind this decision is to make the network more resilient against modern traffic-interception attacks that could compromise data security and undermine Tor user anonymity.

The Tor network is a global system consisting of thousands of relays that create a circuit for data packets to travel to their destination through three relays (entry, middle, and exit), each hop adding a layer of encryption (onion routing).

Users of the Tor Browser, a hardened version of Firefox built for browsing the Tor network, benefit from this onion routing to communicate privately, share or access information anonymously, bypass censorship, and evade ISP-level tracking.

Typically, Tor is used by dissidents, activists, whistleblowers, journalists, researchers, and generally privacy-conscious people, including cybercriminals looking to access darknet markets.

As the Tor team explains in an announcement, Tor1 was developed at a time when cryptography was far less advanced than today, and the standards have improved significantly since then.

One issue with the tor1 design is that it uses AES-CTR encryption without hop-by-hop authentication, which leads to malleable relay encryption. This means that an adversary could modify traffic between relays they control and observe predictable changes - a tagging attack that is part of the internal covert channel class of attacks.

Another problem is that tor1 uses partial forward secrecy by reusing the same AES keys throughout a circuit's lifetime, enabling decryption in the event of key theft.

A third security concern is that tor1 uses a 4-byte SHA-1 digest for cell authentication, giving attackers a one-in-4 billion probability to forge a cell without being detected.

The Tor project notes that only the first attack in the list is more severe, and the last two examples were mentioned "for the sake of completeness."

AnonTechie writes:

Beijing Unveils Supercritical CO2 Turbine That Could Upend Power Tech

China has launched the world's first carbon dioxide–based power generator, using supercritical CO2 instead of steam to produce electricity with over 50% efficiency.

The system harnesses industrial waste heat—such as from steel plants—and needs no water or fuel, reducing maintenance and equipment complexity.

Compact and versatile, the technology could revolutionize carbon capture by using CO2 for profitable energy generation, potentially lowering emissions and storage costs.

China has launched a first-of-its-kind power generator that works with carbon dioxide instead of steam, like traditional generators in power plants. Perhaps more importantly, however, the new generator works with waste heat and boasts a much higher efficiency than existing ones at doing that. According to the company that designed it, the generator is the start of a new era, the South China Morning Post reported.

Normally, thermal power generators work in one of two ways, both relying on heat to turn a turbine. In coal power plants, the burning of coal heats up water until it vaporizes, the vapor then being directed to the turbines that generate electricity. In gas-fired power plants, the turbines are activated by the heat, generated from the compression of gas and its subsequent heating.

Unlike them, the SCMP reported, the new generator uses carbon dioxide in a supercritical state, meaning the compound is subjected to a certain pressure and a certain temperature, which makes it behave simultaneously like a gas and a liquid. The state is called supercritical, hence the whole generator is called a supercritical one. Conveniently, waste heat from sintering in steelmaking plants could reach as much as 700 degrees Celsius—so the inventors of the new generator connected it to one steel works, and to the grid. Even more conveniently, the supercritical state of CO2 does not, in fact, require this high of a temperature.

Original Submission

An Anonymous Coward writes:

https://www.xda-developers.com/your-unpowered-ssd-is-slowly-losing-your-data/

SSDs have all but replaced hard drives when it comes to primary storage. They're orders of magnitude faster, more convenient, and consume less power than mechanical hard drives. That said, if you're also using SSDs for cold storage, expecting the drives lying in your drawer to work perfectly after years, you might want to rethink your strategy. Your reliable SSD could suffer from corrupted or lost data if left unpowered for extended periods. This is why many users don't consider SSDs a reliable long-term storage medium, and prefer using hard drives, magnetic tape, or M-Disc instead.

Unlike hard drives that magnetize spinning discs to store data, SSDs modify the electrical charge in NAND flash cells to represent 0 and 1. NAND flash retains data in underlying transistors even when power is removed, similar to other forms of non-volatile memory. However, the duration for which your SSD can retain data without power is the key here. Even the cheapest SSDs, say those with QLC NAND, can safely store data for about a year of being completely unpowered. More expensive TLC NAND can retain data for up to 3 years, while MLC and SLC NAND are good for 5 years and 10 years of unpowered storage, respectively.

The problem is that most consumer SSDs use only TLC or QLC NAND, so users who leave their SSDs unpowered for over a year are risking the integrity of their data. The reliability of QLC NAND has improved over the years, so you should probably consider 2–3 years of unpowered usage as the guardrails. Without power, the voltage stored in the NAND cells can be lost, either resulting in missing data or completely useless drives.

This data retention deficiency of consumer SSDs makes them an unreliable medium for long-term data storage, especially for creative professionals and researchers. HDDs can suffer from bit rot, too, due to wear and tear, but they're still more resistant to power loss. If you haven't checked your archives in a while, I'd recommend doing so at the earliest.

Original Submission