US spied on Japanese PM Abe, Mitsubishi, and so much more • The Register
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2015/07/31/nsa_spied_on_japan_mitsubishi/
Yup, the US spied on Japan big time…
Reply
Monthly Archives: July 2015
Windows 10 Uses Your Bandwidth to Distribute Updates, Disable It Here
This new distribution method works a lot like torrents do. Everyone has Windows 10 on their machine, so each person seeds a little bit of the files to those who need it, distributing the load across multiple computers and helping everyone download updates quickly. This is a great feature for those who have no data cap and want fast updates. The problem is, many ISPs have some form of data cap. This can potentially use up your allotment of data without you even realizing it’s happened. To turn it off, follow these steps:
Search for “Check for updates” in the Start menu.
Under “Windows Update” choose “Advanced options.”
Under “Choose how updates are installed” click “Choose how updates are delivered.”
Disable the toggle under “Updated from more than one place.”
Source: Windows 10 Uses Your Bandwidth to Distribute Updates, Disable It Here
Classic Shell – Start menu and other Windows enhancements
Classic Shell™ is free software that improves your productivity, enhances the usability of Windows and empowers you to use the computer the way you like it. The main features are:
Highly customizable start menu with multiple styles and skins
Quick access to recent, frequently-used, or pinned programs
Find programs, settings, files and documents
Start button for Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows 8.1 and Windows 10
Toolbar and status bar for Windows Explorer
Caption and status bar for Internet Explorer
Source: Classic Shell – Start menu and other Windows enhancements
How to Do a Clean Install of Windows 10, even after free upgrade
Windows 10 is finally here, and your computer will automatically prompt you to upgrade. But if you’d rather start fresh, you can do a clean install—you just need to follow a few steps in the right order.http://lifehacker.com/5983652/how-to… How to Do a Clean Install of Windows Without Losing Your Files, Settings, and Tweaks How to Do a Clean Install of Windows Without Losing Your Files, Settings, and Tweaks How to Do a Clean Install of Windows Without Losin There’s nothing like a fresh install of Windows to clear your mind, but it comes at a cost:… Read more Read more
Source: How to Do a Clean Install of Windows 10
This works with a free upgrade too, because Microsoft just “knows” your machine and says it’s ok. How does this work then? A bit creepy!
Behavioral Profiling: The password you can’t change. Your identity through how you type
You can be identified by how you type, even behind proxies and Tor. Protect yourself with KeyboardPrivacy.
Source: Behavioral Profiling: The password you can’t change.
Some websites are storing your typing patterns and it turns out that after some training, systems can identify who is in a system by the way in which passwords are typed. You can then be identified on other websites using the same underlying system. Paul Moore has created a proof-of-concept Chrome extension which changes the output of your typing to the website by randomising the rate at which the browser sends it to the website.
Star Wars Death Star Kitchen Timer Urban Collector
Star Wars Death Star Kitchen Timer Urban Collector
Note, it’s a pre-order, so no idea if and when, but it sure looks good to me!
Here’s The Incredibly Hacky Way to Disable Windows 10 Updates – if you know they exist
Windows 10 auto-downloads and auto-installs updates. This is mostly a Good Thing for general security, but becomes a Bad Thing when said update installs a glitchy graphics driver that breaks your desktop. There is a way to disable auto-updates, but it’s not pretty.
Source: Here’s The Incredibly Hacky Way to Disable Windows 10 Updates
Auto updating is an incredibly bad idea – downloading consumes bandwidth (most annoying if you’re on a public wifi), installing causes HD IO and CPU useage (consuming battery and making your laptop hot) and then there is that dreaded auto reboot, where the document or spreadsheet you’ve been working on suddenly disappears in a flash of rebooting now messages.
Please get rid of this, Microsoft! I understand you have auto-update on by default, it’s a good idea for many users, but really, give us a choice!
Study uncovers invisible mobile app ads gumming up the works
Fundamentally, users of the mobile apps are affected because those invisible ads are burning though gigabytes of their data plan every day. The smartphone is slowed down; the ads eat away at batteries too. Performance issues are almost certainly caused by the extra load resulting from the apps’ secondary functions, said Forensiq in Bloomberg Business.Forensiq carried out a ten-day study exploring instances of unseen ads. “About 1% of mobile devices that Forensiq observed in the U.S. and 2% to 3% in Europe and Asia were seen running ‘infected’ apps, including those operating Google Android and Apple iOS operating systems, as well as Microsoft’s Windows Mobile,” said Jack Marshall, who covers marketing and the media for The Wall Street Journal. He also quoted Forensiq founder and CEO David Sendroff: “Users may see one ad on their screen, but there might be 5 or 10 in the background that were never viewable.”
Source: Study uncovers invisible mobile app ads gumming up the works
Engineers test fly printed aircraft off warship
Weighing 3kg and measuring 1.5m the airframe was created on a 3D printer using laser sintered nylon and catapulted off HMS Mersey into the Wyke Regis Training Facility in Weymouth, before landing on Chesil Beach.
Source: Engineers test fly printed aircraft off warship
Chinese Company Constructs the World’s Tallest 3D Printed Building
Chinese company WinSun Decoration Design Engineering Co has expanded the capabilities of 3D printing. After constructing ten houses in under twenty-four hours last year, now they are back with both the world’s tallest 3D printed building – a five-story apartment block – and a 1,100 square meter mansion with internal and external decoration to boot.
Source: Chinese Company Constructs the World’s Tallest 3D Printed Building | ArchDaily
Chinese company assembles 3D-printed villa in less than 3 hours
A pioneering 3D-printed house just popped up in Xian, China – and Chinese company ZhuoDa “built” the two-story villa in less than three hours. Made up of six 3D-printed modules, the house was assembled like LEGO bricks before a live audience who were then invited to explore the interior. The modular fireproof home can withstand a magnitude-9 earthquake and is made from a special construction material the company is keeping secret.
Of course the printing itself took a lot longer, but no figures on how long that was!
NASA’s Kepler Mission Discovers Bigger, Older Cousin to Earth
NASA’s Kepler mission has confirmed the first near-Earth-size planet in the “habitable zone” around a sun-like star. This discovery and the introduction of 11 other new small habitable zone candidate planets mark another milestone in the journey to finding another “Earth.”
The newly discovered Kepler-452b is the smallest planet to date discovered orbiting in the habitable zone — the area around a star where liquid water could pool on the surface of an orbiting planet — of a G2-type star, like our sun. The confirmation of Kepler-452b brings the total number of confirmed planets to 1,030.
“On the 20th anniversary year of the discovery that proved other suns host planets, the Kepler exoplanet explorer has discovered a planet and star which most closely resemble the Earth and our Sun,” said John Grunsfeld, associate administrator of NASA’s Science Mission Directorate at the agency’s headquarters in Washington. “This exciting result brings us one step closer to finding an Earth 2.0.”
Kepler-452b is 60 percent larger in diameter than Earth and is considered a super-Earth-size planet. While its mass and composition are not yet determined, previous research suggests that planets the size of Kepler-452b have a good chance of being rocky.
Source: NASA’s Kepler Mission Discovers Bigger, Older Cousin to Earth
Robot surgeons kill 144 patients, hurt 1,391, malfunction 8,061 times / 1.7 million
A team of university eggheads have counted up the number of medical cockups in America reported to the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) from 2000 to 2013, and found there were 144 deaths during robot-assisted surgery, 1,391 injuries, and 8,061 counts of device malfunctions.
If that sounds terrible, consider that 1.7 million robo-operations were carried out between 2007 and 2013. Whether you’re impressed or appalled, the number of errors has the experts mildly concerned, and they want better safety mechanisms.
Taking Blue Screen of Death to another level
Source: Robot surgeons kill 144 patients, hurt 1,391, malfunction 8,061 times • The Register
It’s tricky to compare these robo-op figures to the error rate of pure-human surgeries for various dull reasons; one being that when mistakes are made, they’re often settled out of court and are never admitted. With a machine involved, someone can blame the hardware.
Hackers invade systems holding medical files on 4.5 million California patients
UCLA Health hospitals say hackers may have accessed personal information and medical records on 4.5 million patients.The California medical group admitted today that miscreants infiltrated its computer systems as long ago as September. It is possible the intruders accessed databases holding patient names, addresses, dates of birth, social security numbers, medical records, health plan numbers, details of medical conditions, lists of medications, and medical test results.
Source: Hackers invade systems holding medical files on 4.5 million Cali patients • The Register
Aren’t centralised databases great? A one stop shop for all your customer records!
UK DRIPA privacy invasion blocked by EU courts
The judges identified two key problems with the law: that it does not provide for independent court or judicial scrutiny to ensure that only data deemed “strictly necessary” is examined; and that there is no definition of what constitutes “serious offences” in relation to which material can be investigated. For legal authority, the judges relied on an earlier decision, known as Digital Rights Ireland, by the European Court of Justice in Luxemburg, which is binding on UK courts.In their challenge, Davis and Watson argued that the law allowed the police and security services to spy on citizens without sufficient privacy safeguards.They said the legislation was incompatible with article eight of the European convention on human rights, the right to respect for private and family life, and articles seven and eight of the EU charter of fundamental rights, respect for private and family life and protection of personal data.The MPs complained that use of communications data was not limited to cases involving serious crime, that individual notices of data retention were kept secret, and that no provision was made for those under obligation of professional confidentiality, in particular lawyers and journalists. Nor, they argued, were there adequate safeguards against communications data leaving the EU.
Source: High court rules data retention and surveillance legislation unlawful | World news | The Guardian
Nice to see that at least EU courts can display sanity from time to time!
Rockets powered by microwave beams
Except Escape Dynamics didn’t fire its engine by setting alight fuel in a controlled explosion, like a traditional rocket. Instead, their engine fired using power beamed at it from a microwave antenna across the room.
]…] It aims to use a giant set of batteries to draw power from the regular electric grid (or on site solar panels, wind turbines, or other available power generation). Once they’re charged and a spaceship is ready to go, power will be sent to a set of modular, phased array microwave antennae spanning a square kilometer. Those antennae will then fire a microwave beam at a heat exchanger on the spaceship. That heat exchanger will heat up the hydrogen in the fuel tank, which is what powers the rocket on the ship into orbit.
Source: This Company Aims To Launch Rockets With Beams Of Power – Forbes
Solar Paper, the world’s thinnest and lightest solar charger by YOLK — Kickstarter goals funded!
Solar Paper measures just 9 x 19 x 1.1 cm when folded, and weighs only 120g (4 oz). Watt-for-watt, it is 85 percent smaller than our closest competitor and 75 percent lighter. Most importantly, Solar Paper is just 1.1 cm deep, at its thickest point, compared to 3.8 cm for our competitor, which also weighs a full pound!
AFC Kredieten loan application data hacked, company responds: Meh, not our customers
A spokeswoman for AFC Kredieten, when asked if customers whose data had been stolen had been informed, replied: “They are not our customers. They are applicants, we had not necessarily organised a loan for them yet. AFC Credits is the victim here. What that group did is illegal and writing about it would be against the law.”
Source: Loan application data hacked, company responds: Meh, not our customers • The Register
Wow! How to not handle this! They collected the data on their website, so that makes them responsible for the data.
ProxyGambit – anonymise your internet traffic via GSM or Radio links
ProxyGambit is a simple anonymization device that allows you to access the Internet from anywhere in the world without revealing your true location or IP, fracturing your traffic from the Internet/IP through either a long distance radio link or a reverse tunneled GSM bridge that ultimately drops back onto the Internet and exits through a wireless network you’re no where near.
While a point to point link is supported, the reverse GSM-to-TCP bridge allows you to proxy from thousands of miles away with nothing other than a computer and Internet with no direct link back to your originating machine.
UK/US naval partnership – much more integration and interoperability
we will seek even more opportunities to exchange personnel.
Already a joint UK-US battlestaff have deployed on operations. I see this type of interchange becoming the norm, particularly in headquarters roles, but we are also exploring the opportunity to mutually support niche or perishable skills.
[Fourthly,] we will pursue mutual investment in the technologies that will allow us to operate together, because innovation has always been the hallmark of battle-winning navies.And absolutely crucial to this relationship, is interoperability.
Not as bolt-on or an afterthought, but right from the word go.
So, through the joint development of a Common Missile Compartment for our Strategic Missile Submarines, a common airframe for the Joint Strike Fighter, common weapon systems and stocks, common data protocols, we are establishing interoperability from the outset.
Source: UK/US naval partnership – Speeches – GOV.UK
This is pretty far reaching partnership and in line with the long standing policy of jointness being explored in eg the combined amphibious forces with the Netherlands and military partnership with the French. Given the huge costs of modern combat platforms this seems to me to be the only sensible way of being able to meet future threats, although I would rather the UK focusses her partnerships on the EU member states instead of the US, whose foreign policy is often much more ambitious (and morally questionable) than that of the UK. The US also has a long and proud history of taking secrets from their allies and returning little to nothing of value in return – eg. F-35 source code.
Spotify Musical Map: What playlist is typical for any city
3 Ports USB 3.0 Hub with RJ45 10/100/1000 Gigabit Ethernet Converter LAN Wired Network Adapter for anything with USB Ports
3 Ports USB 3.0 Hub with RJ45 10/100/1000 Gigabit Ethernet Converter LAN Wired Network Adapter for Laptops, Ultrabooks and Tablet PCs with USB Ports
Awesome plan!
WikiLeaks presents The Hackingteam Archives as searchable emails
Want to buy a classic camera?
Bij online veilinghuis Catawiki kunt u elke week meebieden op meer dan 12.000 bijzondere en unieke objecten in de meer dan 100 wekelijkse veilingen.
Source: Catawiki – Veilinghuis en catalogus voor verzamelaars
Ageing rates vary widely, says study
A study of people born in the same year has uncovered a huge difference in the speed at which their bodies age.
Source: Ageing rates vary widely, says study – BBC News