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Apple refutes every claim made in DOJ's antitrust lawsuit
Apple refuted the DOJ's claims in its lawsuit via statements shared with Apple Insider.
Will AI revolutionize professional soccer recruitment?
The Major League Soccer announced it will start using AI-powered tools in its talent recruitment process. The professional sports industry has been primed for the potential impact of artificial intelligence. But is it too soon to say that AI has entered the mainstream in soccer?
Air National Guard member arrested in connection to Discord classified documents leak
Airman First Class Jack Douglas Teixeira has been arrested.
The US officially rejoins the Paris climate change agreement
One of the first things President Biden did after his inauguration was to sign an executive order saying the US will rejoin the Paris Agreement. Today, that move is official.
How Biden and Harris could refocus the White House on science
In each of its annual budget requests, the Trump administration made deep funding cuts to federal research spending, in spite of Congress’ consistent refusals. It asked for double funding to those departments in the National Science Foundation, the National Institutes of Health, the Department of Energy, Darpa, and the Joint AI Center to $2 billion annually. While decried as wholly inadequate to address the field’s rate of technical advance, that funding bump would come at the expense of funding other basic sciences in those same agencies, as well as an overall reduction in research and development spending by 9 percent over 2020, to $142.2 billion.
Amazon workers plan Black Friday strikes and protests in 15 countries
Demands include improved pay and safety conditions, and transparency over privacy and user data.
Uber Pool suspended in US and Canada to limit coronavirus spread
Uber Pool has been suspended in the US and Canada, according to Reuters. The ride-hailing giant has put its carpooling service on hold to help limit the spread of COVID-19 -- it'll be impossible to maintain "social distancing" when you have to share a car with several strangers, after all. Uber has disabled the option in both countries, so you can't share a trip with up to three passengers to save money for a while.
Huawei reports increased sales despite US sanctions
Huawei's latest quarterly results show that the Chinese company is doing just fine, despite ongoing trade issues with America. Third-quarter revenue is up 24.4 percent on the same period last year, while the company says it has shipped more than 185 million smartphones in the first three quarters of 2019, up 26 percent year-on-year.
Facebook will show who paid for political ads in the UK
Facebook is pushing its transparency agenda again, this time with the introduction of a tool that reveals information about political ads in the UK. From today, all advertisers that run ads in the UK referencing political figures and parties, elections and legislation before parliament will have to verify their location and identity, and the adverts will have to carry a "paid for by" disclaimer.
ISPs barred from telling users they’re under FBI investigation
Back in 2013, a federal judge ruled that the FBI couldn't force ISPs to hand over a users' private data without the suspect being informed first. Now, however, a change in the law means that's no longer the case. Thanks to a federal appeals court ruling on Monday, ISPs, financial institutions and phone carriers are now completely prohibited from informing a user if the FBI is investigating them. Under the new 'gag' ruling, the FBI can still issue a National Security Letter (or NSL) without immediately notifying their target, but must instead review the need for an NSL three years after the letter was sent. On top of that, the FBI must also completely terminate their prying into the user's online activities once the national security investigation in question has concluded.
US: North Korea's been hacking everyone since 2009
US authorities believe the North Korean government has been using an army of hackers called "Hidden Cobra" to deploy cyber attacks over the past eight years. That's according to the Technical Alert formally issued by the Homeland Security and the FBI, which contains the details and tools NK's cyber army has been using to infiltrate the media, financial, aerospace and critical infrastructure sectors in the US and around the globe. The government agencies issued the alert after tracing the IP addresses of a malware variant used to manage NK's DDoS attacks to North Korean computers. While other players can spoof their IPs to frame NK, the US is encouraging cyber analysts to be on the lookout, warning them that the Asian country will continue to use cyber operations to advance its government's military and strategic objectives.
Google: 4 out of 5 US homes have solar power potential
A five kilowatt rooftop solar installation now costs just $12,500 on average after tax credits, and pretty soon, installing one might soon be a matter of re-tiling your roof. Whether it's right for you, however, depends in large part on how much sun your house gets. That's where Google's Project Sunroof comes in -- launched just two years ago, it has now surveyed over 60 million US buildings in 50 states. That means there's a good chance you can see the electricity production potential in your city, neighborhood and even specific house.
Snowden document suggests NSA could have proof of Russian hack
The FBI, CIA and President Barack Obama all agree that Russia hacked the DNC and asserted its will on the US presidential election -- but the winner of that contest isn't so sure. "It could be somebody else." Donald Trump told reporters over New Years. "Hacking is a hard thing to prove." Except, as it turns out, US intelligence has a pretty good track record of tracing security breaches back to the Kremlin. According to a new document leaked by Edward Snowden, the NSA has successfully traced a hack back to Russian intelligence at least once before.
Library of Congress repatriates 163,000 files to Afghanistan
The Library of Congress has completed a three-year project to digitize 163,000 documents relating to the cultural history of Afghanistan, and this week officials handed over these hard drives to the Afghan Minister of Information and Culture, Abdul Bari Jahani, and Abdul Wahid Wafa, Executive Director of the Afghanistan Centre at Kabul University. The collection will reside in 10 Afghan institutions, including the National Library of Afghanistan, National Archive of Afghanistan, American University of Afghanistan, Kabul University and Kandahar University. This concludes a project that began in January 2013 with a grant from the Carnegie Corporation of New York.
NASA orders a second ISS crew delivery from SpaceX
It's been awhile since NASA has sent an astronaut to the stars from domestic soil, but it could be come commonplace soon enough. Today, the space agency announced that it ordered a second ISS crew rotation mission from Elon Musk's SpaceX. This is the fourth flight NASA has ordered through its Commercial Crew Transportation Capability contracts, and a big step forward towards eliminating the space agency's reliance on Russia for crew rotation.
'Mr. Robot' season 2 trailer makes us giddy for revolution
After last year's surprising (but not completely unexpected) Mr. Robot season finale, hacker Elliot Alderson (Rami Malek) and the fsociety are back. But, if you're hoping the season two trailer will shed any light about what's happening with Alderson and his hactivist collective, you're out of luck.
'Mr. Robot' season 2.0 hits USA on July 13
Everyone's favorite paranoid hacker dreamboat returns to type furiously and maybe destroy capitalism in season two of Mr. Robot, premiering on USA July 13. The show follows Elliot Alderson (Rami Malek), a genius hacker who gets roped into an underground society of digital anarchists, "F-Society," led by a shady fellow named Mr. Robot (Christian Slater).
Sprint coaxes you away from Verizon with double data
Sprint has launched a new set of wireless plans that offer more than twice the data as Verizon for the same price. The Better Choice offering is designed to sit side-by-side with Verizon's S-XXL tiers, but while $100 would get you 18GB of data on Big Red, Sprint will hand you 40GB. Sprint is also, as usual, pledging to throw up to $650 worth of credit your way to help you leave your current contract.
President Obama wants US to 'reignite its spirit of innovation'
President Obama gave his final State of the Union address on Tuesday. In it, he discussed how far the country has come over the last year and where he sees it going in the future. But beyond the expected talk of a rebuilt, stronger economy, soaring high school graduation rates and new civil liberties, he laid out a bold plan to, as he puts it, make "technology work for us, and not against us."
FDA approves world's first GMO fish: fast-growing Atlantic Salmon
In a landmark decision more than two decades in the making, the US Food and Drug Administration announced its approval of a genetically modified Atlantic Salmon variant on Thursday. The AquAdvantage salmon, which was initially developed back in 1989 and submitted for approval in 1995, grows far faster than its conventionally bred brethren. The FDA has deemed it safe for human consumption, equally nutritious as other salmon varieties and not dangerous to the environment. And since the GMO salmon is considered nutritionally equivalent to regular salmon supermarkets will be able to carry the fish without having to label them being GMO.
