yorker-vanity – Page 9 – Tech Today w/ Ken May

Two months after FBI debacle, Tor Project still can’t get an answer from CMU

Proof of connection: the site check.torproject.org will show you if you’re connected via Tor. (credit: Tor) Shari Steele, Executive Director of the Tor Project (credit: EFF ) It’s been quite a few months for the Tor Project. Last November, project co-founder and director Roger Dingledine accused the FBI of paying Carnegie Mellon computer security researchers at least $1 million to de-anonymize Tor users and reveal their IP addresses as part of a large criminal investigation. The FBI dismissed things, but the investigation in question is a very high-profile matter focused on members of the Silk Road online-drug marketplace. One of the IP addresses revealed belonged to Brian Farrell, an alleged Silk Road 2 lieutenant. An early filing in Farrell’s case, first reported by Vice Motherboard, said that a “university-based research institute” aided government efforts to unmask Farrell. That document fit with Ars reporting from January 2015, when a Homeland Security search warrant affidavit stated that from January to July 2014, a “source of information” provided law enforcement “with particular IP addresses” that accessed the vendor-side of Silk Road 2. By July 2015, the Tor Project managed to discover and shut down this sustained attack. But the Tor Project further concluded that the attack resembled a technique described by a team of Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) researchers who a few weeks earlier had canceled a security conference presentation on a low-cost way to deanonymize Tor users . The Tor officials went on to warn that an intelligence agency from a global adversary also might have been able to capitalize on the vulnerability. Read 59 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Two months after FBI debacle, Tor Project still can’t get an answer from CMU

General Motors pledges $500 million to Lyft for driverless taxi research

On Monday, General Motors and ride-sharing company Lyft announced a new partnership to develop a network of driverless taxis. GM has invested $500 million in Lyft as part of a $1 billion funding round. The partnership includes a seat for GM on Lyft’s board of directors. Neither Lyft nor GM mentioned how soon they expect to realize their driverless taxi dream. In a press release , GM said it would work with Lyft to “leverage GM’s deep knowledge of autonomous technology.” Lyft promised “to build a network of on demand autonomous vehicles that will make getting around more affordable, accessible and enjoyable.” GM’s labs have been testing the waters with autonomous concept cars , even hinting in October that the company’s strategy in 2016 would be “aggressive” and would include a fleet of self driving Chevrolet Volts . Lyft declined to comment publicly on how a fleet of driverless taxis would impact current Lyft drivers. Read 1 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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General Motors pledges $500 million to Lyft for driverless taxi research

Files on nearly 200 floppy disks belonging to Star Trek creator recovered

(credit: churl ) According to a press release from DriveSavers data recovery, information on nearly 200 floppy disks that belonged to Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry has been recovered. The information on the disks belongs to Roddenberry’s estate and has not been disclosed to the general public. DriveSavers notes, however, that Roddenberry used the disks to store his work and “to capture story ideas, write scripts and [take] notes.” VentureBeat reports that the disks, containing 160KB of data each, were likely used and written in the ’80s. The circumstances of the information recovery are particularly interesting, however. Several years after the death of Roddenberry, his estate found the 5.25-inch floppy disks. Although the Star Trek creator originally typed his scripts on typewriters, he later moved his writing to two custom-built computers with custom-made operating systems before purchasing more mainstream computers in advance of his death in 1991. Read 2 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Files on nearly 200 floppy disks belonging to Star Trek creator recovered

Beating graphene to push supercapacitors closer to batteries

(credit: Oak Ridge National Lab ) Most people think of batteries when they consider energy storage, but capacitors are an alternative in some use cases. Capacitors are used in almost all electronic devices, often to supply temporary power when batteries are being changed to prevent loss of information. In addition to everyday devices, they are also used in more obscure technologies, including certain types of weapons. Understanding the supercapacitor Unlike batteries, capacitors use static electricity to store energy. In their simplest form, they contain two conducting metallic plates with an insulating material (dielectric) placed in between. A typical capacitor charges instantly but usually cannot hold a great deal of charge. Supercapacitors can at least partly overcome this shortcoming. They differ from the typical capacitor in that their “plates” provide significantly larger surface area and are much closer together. The surface area is increased by coating the metal plates with a porous substance. Instead of having a dielectric material between them, the plates of a supercapacitor are soaked in an electrolyte and separated by an extremely thin insulator. Read 11 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Beating graphene to push supercapacitors closer to batteries

ArcaBoard is a real hoverboard—but it’ll cost you $20,000

(credit: Arca Space Corporation ) After all the teased products that didn’t live up to their promises and the trouble caused by self-balancing scooters, ArcaBoard appears to be the closest we’ll get to an actual hoverboard in 2015. Designed by the US-based Arca Space Corporation, the mattress-shaped vehicle packs 272 horsepower and is propelled by 36 ducted fans spinning at 45,000rpm. Buying one will set you back about £13,500 ($19,900). Arca has begun taking pre-orders for ArcaBoard and promises to start shipping it to the customers in April 2016. The device’s speed is limited to 20km/h (12mph) and its flying height to 30cm (1ft). It’s powered by a set of Li-Po batteries that account for a significant part of its price: getting a new battery pack after the 1-year warranty has expired will cost you £4,600 ($6,840). There are two versions of the device: one for riders that weigh up to 80kg (176lbs), and another for riders up to 110kg (242lbs). The lighter option can hover for six minutes, the heavier just three minutes. The lighter rider can theoretically travel up to 2km (1.2mi) on one charge. Read 7 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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ArcaBoard is a real hoverboard—but it’ll cost you $20,000

YouTube mad at T-Mobile for throttling video traffic

(credit: Aurich Lawson) T-Mobile USA’s recently instituted practice of downgrading video quality to 480p in order to reduce data usage now has a prominent critic: YouTube. “Reducing data charges can be good for users, but it doesn’t justify throttling all video services, especially without explicit user consent,” a YouTube spokesperson said, according to a Wall Street Journal article today . T-Mobile’s “Binge On” program automatically reduces the quality of video while allowing many video services to stream without counting against customers’ high-speed data limits. Video services that cooperate with T-Mobile by meeting the company’s “technical criteria” have their videos exempted from customers’ data caps. Netflix, HBO, Hulu, and many others worked with T-Mobile to get the exemption. Read 10 remaining paragraphs | Comments

Self-driving Ford Fusions are coming to California next year

Apart from the sensor bar on the roof, this Ford Fusion Hybrid looks just like a normal car. (credit: Jonathan Gitlin) Even more robots are coming to California’s roads next year. Yesterday, Ford announced that it will start testing its autonomous Fusion sedans in the state now that it is officially enrolled in the California Autonomous Vehicle Testing Program . The company opened a new R&D center in Palo Alto at the beginning of the year, which among other projects has been working on virtual simulations of autonomous driving as well as sensor fusion to improve the way its cars perceive the world around them. Ford is the 11th group to obtain a California driving license for its autonomous cars, joining other OEMs (BMW, Mercedes-Benz, Honda, Nissan, Tesla, and Volkswagen Group), tier one suppliers (Bosch and Delphi ), and tech companies (Cruise Automation and Google). A condition of the self-driving car regulations requires companies to provide California’s DMV with a report any time one of their cars is involved in a collision. Since the rules went into effect in September 2014, there have been a total of 10 incidents . The first, in October 2014, involved one of Delphi’s test vehicles, although it was being driven by a human at the time. The nine other incidents all involve Google’s cars, seven of which were being driven autonomously. Read 1 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Self-driving Ford Fusions are coming to California next year

OneDrive for Business to get unlimited storage for enterprise customers

Amid the brouhaha surrounding Microsoft’s decision to backtrack on its offer of unlimited OneDrive storage for home Office 365 subscribers , one issue remained unaddressed: what about the related OneDrive for Business storage that’s offered to enterprise Office 365 subscribers? The company has finally laid out its plans for these users, and unlimited storage is back for at least some. Enterprise and government customers on the E3, E4, and E5 plans, education customers, and OneDrive for Business Plan 2 and SharePoint Online Plan 2 customers will all see their storage allocation increased provided that the organization has at least five subscribers. This move to unlimited storage will be phased in two parts. The first part will be an automatic increase from the current 1TB to a new 5TB per user, expected to complete by the end of March 2016. Subsequently, customers will be able to request additional storage. Read 3 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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OneDrive for Business to get unlimited storage for enterprise customers

Hackers actively exploit critical vulnerability in sites running Joomla

Enlarge / An payload that’s been modified so it can’t be misused. Malicious hackers are using it to perform an object injection attack that leads to a full remote command execution. (credit: Sucuri ) Attackers are actively exploiting a critical remote command-execution vulnerability that has plagued the Joomla content management system for almost eight years, security researchers said. A patch for the vulnerability, which affects versions 1.5 through 3.4.5, was released Monday morning . It was too late: the bug was already being exploited in the wild, researchers from security firm Sucuri warned in a blog post . The attacks started on Saturday from a handful of IP addresses and by Sunday included hundreds of exploit attempts to sites monitored by Sucuri. “Today (Dec 14th), the wave of attacks is even bigger, with basically every site and honeypot we have being attacked,” the blog post reported. “That means that probably every other Joomla site out there is being targeted as well.” Read 2 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Hackers actively exploit critical vulnerability in sites running Joomla

DirecTV will broadcast live 4K content by “early next year”

(credit: Adam Melancon ) Even if 4K TVs were popular Black Friday and Cyber Monday steals, there continues to be a lack of 4K content to watch on them. DirecTV wants to provide a solution: the company’s SVP of Video and Space Communications Phil Goswitz confirmed at New York’s TranSPORT conference that DirecTV will launch a live 4K broadcasting service sometime in “early 2016.” At the conference, Goswitz explained that the company currently has the ability to transmit up to 50 new UHD channels, and live sports transmissions are already being tested as part of next year’s rollout. DirecTV already has the hardware in place, and according to Goswitz, the company wants to get ahead of cable companies and provide viewers with 4K content they can’t get from their cable companies. “I think the belief that there are technology challenges is a bit of a misinformed myth,” he said. “I think technology throughout the entire ecosystem is ready. But I think content is king; the plane is ready to take off and there is no king on board.” Goswitz went on to say that DirecTV is “moving into working with partners” to create more 4K content. Currently Netflix and YouTube have some 4K video ready to stream, but most companies continue to focus on hardware. Roku and TiVo recently came out with updated set-top boxes ready for 4K streaming, but they still have to work with the finite amount of 4K content available. Read 1 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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DirecTV will broadcast live 4K content by “early next year”