Airbnb Announces Its Plan To House 100,000 People In Need

New submitter mirandakatz writes: Airbnb has just unveiled its Open Homes Platform, a home-sharing site for hosts motivated by goodwill instead of profits — and for guests motivated by need rather than wanderlust. Specifically, Airbnb is going to begin by connecting refugees with hosts in Canada, France, Greece, and the United States. Ultimately, refugees will be just one group that the site aims to help: Site visitors can also nominate other groups of people for temporary placements, and the platform will expand to include them eventually. At Backchannel, Jessi Hempel dives into the home-sharing platform’s latest effort, and places it in the context of the company’s broader business strategy. Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Airbnb Announces Its Plan To House 100,000 People In Need

Electric Vehicles Have Another Record Year, Reaching 2 Million Cars In 2016

An anonymous reader shares a report from the International Energy Agency: The number of electric cars on the roads around the world rose to 2 million in 2016, following a year of strong growth in 2015, according to the latest edition of the International Energy Agency’s Global EV Outlook. China remained the largest market in 2016, accounting for more than 40% of the electric cars sold in the world. With more than 200 million electric two-wheelers and more than 300, 000 electric buses, China is by far the global leader in the electrification of transport. China, the US and Europe made up the three main markets, totaling over 90% of all EVs sold around the world. Electric car deployment in some markets is swift. In Norway, electric cars had a 29% market share last year, the highest globally, followed by the Netherlands with 6.4%, and Sweden with 3.4%. The electric car market is set to transition from early deployment to mass market adoption over the next decade or so. Between 9 and 20 million electric car could be deployed by 2020, and between 40 and 70 million by 2025, according to estimates based on recent statement from carmakers. Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Electric Vehicles Have Another Record Year, Reaching 2 Million Cars In 2016

Verizon Expected To Cut Up To 1,000 Yahoo, AOL Jobs After Acquisition

Verizon’s acquisition and merger of AOL and Yahoo will result in many job cuts. According to Recode, up to 1, 000 AOL and Yahoo jobs are expected to take place across the two companies as the merger is completed. From the report: This action is not unexpected, given that both companies have a lot of redundancies, including in human resources, finance, marketing and general administration. The merger between the two companies — after Verizon bought both in succession to add tech and content to its mobile services — is expected to be completed in the next week. The shareholder meeting to approve the deal takes place tomorrow. Plans to combine both companies have been in the works for a while, as the pair attempt to make a cohesive unit out of two entities that have multiple assets and also multiple problems. It will be headed by AOL CEO Tim Armstrong, who will become the CEO of Oath, the new name for the Verizon subsidiary. Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Verizon Expected To Cut Up To 1,000 Yahoo, AOL Jobs After Acquisition

Internet cameras have hard-coded password that can’t be changed

Enlarge (credit: F-Secure ) Security cameras manufactured by China-based Foscam are vulnerable to remote take-over hacks that allow attackers to view video feeds, download stored files, and possibly compromise other devices connected to a local network. That’s according to a 12-page report released Wednesday by security firm F-Secure. Researchers at F-Secure documented 18 vulnerabilities that the manufacturer has yet to fix despite being alerted to them several months ago. All of the flaws were confirmed in a camera marketed under the Opticam i5 HD brand. A smaller number of the vulnerabilities were also found in the Foscam C2. The report said the weaknesses are likely to exist in many other camera models Foscam manufactures and sells under other brand names. F-Secure researchers wrote: Read 5 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Internet cameras have hard-coded password that can’t be changed

Russian Malware Communicates Using Britney Spears’s Instagram Account

JustAnotherOldGuy writes: A key weakness in malicious software is the “Command and Control” (C&C) system — a central server that the malware-infected systems contact to receive updates and instructions, and to send stolen data. Anti-malware researchers like to reverse engineer malicious code, discover the C&C server’s address, and then shut it down. Turla is an “advanced persistent threat” hacking group based in Russia with a long history of attacking states in ways that advance Russian state interests. A new analysis by Eset shows that Turla is solving its C&C problems by using Britney Spears’ Instagram account as a cut-out for its C&C servers. Turla moves the C&C server around, then hides the current address of the server in encrypted comments left on Britney Spears’s image posts. The compromised systems check in with Spears’ Instagram whenever they need to know where the C&C server is currently residing. Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Russian Malware Communicates Using Britney Spears’s Instagram Account

Wikimedia Executives Receive Six-figure Golden Handshakes

Andreas Kolbe writes: The Wikimedia Foundation’s (WMF) recently released Form 990 shows that the organisation has developed a practice of handing outgoing managers six-figure severance payments, The Register reports. The foundation, which relies entirely on unpaid volunteers to generate the content of its websites, has taken around $300 million dollars over the past five years through fundraising banners placed on Wikipedia. The WMF says it is “committed to communicating with our volunteers, donors, and stakeholders in an open, accountable, and timely manner”, but has long been criticised for providing little transparency on the salaries of its executives, limiting itself to the legally required Form 990 disclosures that only become public two years after the event. Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Wikimedia Executives Receive Six-figure Golden Handshakes

Clever snap-on USB charger faceplate for normal US/Canadian power receptacles

I’m intrigued by this cleverly designed USB charger faceplate for US/Canadian power receptacles: you unscrew your existing faceplate, insert this one into the receptable so that its USB charger leads make contact with the screws on the sides of the receptacle, and screw it back in, and in theory, you now have two power outlets and two USB charger outlets. (more…)

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Clever snap-on USB charger faceplate for normal US/Canadian power receptacles

Remove unused apps in iOS 11 without losing your data

Of the many apps you likely have on your iPhone or iPad right now, how many do you actually use regularly? Chances are that you have at least a few that you’re keeping merely because they have data you don’t want to lose. Well, all that is about to change: iOS 11 will allow you to delete apps, but retain their settings and data. Cydia Geeks first spotted the feature that Apple calls “offloading, ” and it’s great news for people who are constantly struggling with storage space on their phones . The current “Storage & iCloud Usage” option within the iPhone’s settings will be renamed “iPhone Storage” in iOS 11. (Presumably, if you’re working on an iPad, it will be called “iPad Storage.) Within that menu is an innocuous-looking option called “Offload Unused Apps, ” with an Enable option. Apple’s menu description says, “Automatically offload unused apps when you’re low on storage. Your documents & data will be saved.” What’s more, it appears you can choose individual apps to offload if you don’t want to depend on Apple to automatically manage the process for you. Choosing the “Offload App” option for an individual app does the following, according to Apple: “This will free up storage used by the app, but keep its documents and data. Reinstalling the app will place back your data if the app is still available in the App Store.” It’s worth noting that many apps, such as Google Drive, Facebook and Twitter, already store data in the cloud, so it’s easy to delete and reinstall them as needed. But for any apps that you must keep to avoid losing data (such as games), offloading could be just what people with storage issues are looking for. Indeed, this feature could entirely break us of the habit of keeping apps around just in case we need them one day. Via: 9to5Mac Source: Cydia Geeks

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Remove unused apps in iOS 11 without losing your data

Maker Update: Hakko FX-901 cordless soldering iron

This week in Maker Update, Donald Bell presents a zoetrope combined with a fidget spinner, an SLS printer from Formlabs, a Raspberry Pi weather chamber, component carnage, and a tiny OLED Pi screen. Our featured Cool Tool is the Hakko FX-901 cordless soldering iron. Read the full review on Cool Tools .

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Maker Update: Hakko FX-901 cordless soldering iron

Apple To Phase Out 32-Bit Mac Apps Starting In January 2018

Apple will be phasing out 32-bit apps with iOS 11, and soon the company will make the same changes on its macOS operating system. During its Platform State of the Union keynote at the Worldwide Developers Conference, Apple told developers that macOS High Sierra will be the “last macOS release to support 32-bit apps without compromises.” MacRumors reports: Starting in January of 2018, all new apps submitted to the Mac App Store must be 64-bit, and all apps and app updates submitted must be 64-bit by June 2018. With the next version of macOS after High Sierra, Apple will begin “aggressively” warning users about 32-bit apps before eventually phasing them out all together. In iOS 11, 32-bit apps cannot be installed or launched. Attempting to open a non-supported 32-bit app gives a message notifying users that the app needs to be updated before it can run on iOS 11. Prior to phasing out 32-bit apps on iOS 11, Apple gave both end users and developers several warnings, and the company says it will follow the same path for the macOS operating system. Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Apple To Phase Out 32-Bit Mac Apps Starting In January 2018