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Running WordPress? Got webshot enabled? Turn it off or you’re toast

A zero-day vulnerability in the popular TimThumb plugin for WordPress leaves many websites vulnerable to exploits that allow unauthorized attackers to execute malicious code, security researchers have warned. The vulnerability, which was disclosed Tuesday on the Full Disclosure mailing list , affects WordPress sites that have TimThumb installed with the webshot option enabled. Fortunately, it is disabled by default, and sites that are hosted on WordPress.com are also not susceptible. Still, at press time, there was no patch for the remote-code execution hole. People who are unsure if their WordPress-enabled site is vulnerable should open the timthumb file inside their theme or plugin directory, search for the text string “WEBSHOT_ENABLED,” and ensure that it’s set to false. When “WEBSHOT_ENABLED” is set to true, attackers can create or delete files and execute a variety of other commands, Daniel Cid, CTO of security firm Sucuri, warned in a blog post published Thursday . He said uploading a file to a vulnerable site was possible using URLs such as the following, where a.txt was the file being created: Read 1 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Running WordPress? Got webshot enabled? Turn it off or you’re toast

Astronomers Discover Earth-Sized Diamond

ygslash (893445) writes Astronomers at the National Radio Astronomy Observatory announced that they have discovered what appears to be the coolest white dwarf ever detected. The white dwarf is formerly a star similar to our own sun which, after expending all of its fuel, has cooled to less than a chilly 3000 degrees Kelvin and contracted to a size approximately the same as Earth. A white dwarf is composed mostly of carbon and oxygen, and the astronomers believe that at that temperature it would be mostly crystallized, forming something like a huge diamond. Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Astronomers Discover Earth-Sized Diamond

A Refurbished Bus Will Bring Showers to the Homeless in San Francisco

An old MUNI bus in San Francisco is getting a second life with a noble cause. Outfitted with toilets and showers, Lava Mae ‘s refurbished bus will bring mobile bathrooms to homeless people around the city. The long-awaited bus will make its first rounds this weekend . Read more…

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A Refurbished Bus Will Bring Showers to the Homeless in San Francisco

Are those lost IRS e-mails “unbelievable”? Not really

Former IRS official Lois Lerner giving testimony to a Congressional committee in 2013. The IRS says it can’t find her e-mails from before 2011. During a hearing held yesterday by the House Oversight Committee, Committee Chairman Darrel Issa said that it was “unbelievable” that the IRS had lost the e-mails of former IRS official Lois Lerner. While Congressman Issa is not generally ignorant on tech issues, he’s clearly not familiar with just how believable such a screw-up is. The IRS claims that many of Lerner’s e-mails were lost when the hard drive on her desktop computer crashed in 2011. In a Monday night hearing, IRS Commissioner John Koskinen told Issa and the Oversight Committee that there was no way to recover these e-mails. “If you have a magical way for me to do that,” he told Issa, “I’d be happy to hear about it.” The IRS is not the only federal agency to lose e-mails over the past few years. In fact, despite efforts at many agencies to standardize and improve e-mail by moving to services like Google Apps for Government and Microsoft Office 365 Government, many agencies still run their e-mail like it’s 1999. It’s not just a technology issue—it’s an IT policy issue, a staffing issue, and a cultural issue within government, one that the federal government shares with many private corporations. Read 12 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Are those lost IRS e-mails “unbelievable”? Not really

Android L is bringing better battery life to all, battery saver squeezes out 90 extra minutes

Even as smartphones are getting bigger and better, battery life is often an issue. Google announced today at I/O that it’s upcoming version of Android includes “Project Volta” to take the problem head-on. A “battery historian” gives more info on exactly what’s draining energy, while a battery saver mode lets users squeeze up to an extra 90 minutes out of each charge by doing things like lowering the screen refresh rate. Developing… Filed under: Cellphones , Mobile , Google Comments

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Android L is bringing better battery life to all, battery saver squeezes out 90 extra minutes

A Brief History of Unusual Objects Designed to Kill People from Far Away, Part 1a: The Mongol Bow

The hard part about killing people is that sometimes they kill you back. (Just ask Prince Oberyn.) So at some point, some primitive pugilist concluded it would be better if one was not within arm’s reach of the person one was trying to kill. One way you can do this is to kill your opponent with kindness. But this can take an unsatisfyingly long time. A more immediate way to kill someone from afar is with a ranged weapon. Spears and slings were relatively simple to make, but no civilization could gain an enduring military advantage with such basic and duplicable weapons. The earliest example of an object that required both design and manufacturing know-how, and which led to a tremendously decisive advantage, was probably the 13th Century Mongol bow. Bows and arrows have been around for tens of thousands of years—depending on who you listen to, we may have had them 64, 000 freaking years ago —but the Mongol bow was a standout. First off, it was made out of something like the carbon fiber of that era, a complicated-to-make sandwich of horn, wood or bamboo, and strands of animal sinew all laminated together with animal glue. The horn provided the rigidity, the wood or bamboo provided the flex, and the elastic sinew laminated to the wood helped store potential energy as the string was drawn. The traditional problem with composite bows was that they tended to delaminate when wet, as water dissolved the animal glue holding them together. Since the Mongols didn’t like the idea that they would have to surrender if it was raining out, and throwing arrows by hand didn’t seem terribly practical, they either developed or stole the technology to produce a waterproof lacquer. By coating their bows with this stuff, they effectively made them all-weather. And the results were simply devastating. (more…)

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A Brief History of Unusual Objects Designed to Kill People from Far Away, Part 1a: The Mongol Bow

Magic fabric doesn’t catch fire after being doused with molten aluminum

The molten aluminum being poured out onto the thin black fabric is bubbling at a scorching 1500 degrees Fahrenheit. That’s hot. And yet, for all the heat and fire and flame power, the magic fabric easily withstands the burning liquid metal. The fabric doesn’t catch fire, it doesn’t get burned through and there’s not a single hole in it. What is this sorcery? Read more…

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Magic fabric doesn’t catch fire after being doused with molten aluminum

Citronella Ink Helps This Clever Newspaper Keep Mosquitoes At Bay

In some parts of the world a mosquito bite is a minor inconvenience that might result in a few days of uncomfortable itching. In other parts, though, the pests spread deadly diseases like malaria and dengue fever. So for the 2014 World Health Day, ad agency Leo Burnett created the world’s first mosquito-repelling newspaper in Sri Lanka. Read more…

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Citronella Ink Helps This Clever Newspaper Keep Mosquitoes At Bay

Paint.NET 4.0 Updates with Better Performance, Selections, Shapes

Windows: Free image editor Paint.NET has released its first major update in six years. The new version packs a better rendering engine and a bunch of other improvements that still rank it as an essential Windows download . Read more…

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Paint.NET 4.0 Updates with Better Performance, Selections, Shapes

Brain implant restores control of paralyzed muscles

The quadriplegia that comes as a result of a serious spinal cord injury cuts off the lines of communication between a person’s brain and their limbs. The condition is often irreparable, and those who suffer it do so for the rest of their lives, but surgeons at Ohio State University and researchers at Battelle might have just struck back at the condition. Using a technology called Neurobridge, the pair have been able to offer Ian Burkhart, a 23-year-old who was paralyzed after a diving accident, the ability to move his hand with his own thoughts for the first time in four years. Neurobridge works thanks to a chip that’s been implanted into the patient’s motor center, which relays those signals, via a muscle stimulation sleeve, directly to the subject’s muscles. That way, the technology bypasses the damaged nerves, essentially cutting out the middle man and restoring direct muscular control to the brain. The transmissions take less than a tenth of a second to be processed and sent, so while it won’t be as fast as the biological process, could still help people live relatively normal lives. Naturally, this first test isn’t going to mean an instant cure for people with spinal cord injuries, but the first moment of Burkhart twitching his fingers after four years, available in the video below, is a huge breakthrough. Filed under: Science Comments Via: Sky News Source: OSU , (2) , Battelle

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Brain implant restores control of paralyzed muscles