Archive for the 'Technology' Category
Algae to Crude Oil: Million-Year Natural Process Takes Minutes in the Lab
December 19th, 2013Via: U.S. Department of Energy / Pacific Northwest National Laboratory: Engineers have created a continuous chemical process that produces useful crude oil minutes after they pour in harvested algae — a verdant green paste with the consistency of pea soup. The research by engineers at the Department of Energy’s Pacific Northwest National Laboratory was reported […]
4096-Bit RSA Broken Using Data Contained in Audio Emissions from Computers
December 19th, 2013Via: ExtremeTech: Security researchers have successfully broken one of the most secure encryption algorithms, 4096-bit RSA, by listening – yes, with a microphone — to a computer as it decrypts some encrypted data. The attack is fairly simple and can be carried out with rudimentary hardware. The repercussions for the average computer user are minimal, […]
Saab Wins Brazil Jet Deal After NSA Spying Sours Boeing Bid
December 18th, 2013Via: Reuters: Brazil awarded a $4.5 billion contract to Saab AB on Wednesday to replace its aging fleet of fighter jets, a surprise coup for the Swedish company after news of U.S. spying on Brazilians helped derail Boeing’s chances for the deal. The contract, negotiated over the course of three presidencies, will supply Brazil’s air […]
Who Owns the World’s Biggest Bitcoin Wallet? The FBI
December 18th, 2013Via: Wired: Who owns the single largest Bitcoin wallet on the internet? The U.S. government. In September, the FBI shut down the Silk Road online drug marketplace, and it started seizing bitcoins belonging to the Dread Pirate Roberts — the operator of the illicit online marketplace, who they say is an American man named Ross […]
No Matter How Hard You Try to Hide, This Professional Skip Tracer Will Find You
December 18th, 2013Via: Wired: At 4’11” and just over 100 pounds, Michelle Gomez does not look like the sort of person you’d hire to retrieve earthmoving equipment stolen by a peruvian crime family. But in the summer of 2013, that’s exactly what she was doing. Gomez, the proprietor of a one-woman operation in Lockhart, Texas, called Unlimited […]
Facebook Can See What Users Type Even If Status Is Not Posted
December 18th, 2013Via: Los Angeles Times: Facebook has said that it is within its terms of service to see what users are typing even when the status or comment is never posted on the social network. The Menlo Park, Calif., company confirmed that it can track users’ unpublished posts after two Facebook researchers disclosed that they had […]
Middlebrow Megachurch Infotainment: “We Need to Talk About TED”
December 18th, 2013Via: Benjamin Bratton: In our culture, talking about the future is sometimes a polite way of saying things about the present that would otherwise be rude or risky. But have you ever wondered why so little of the future promised in TED talks actually happens? So much potential and enthusiasm, and so little actual change. […]
Most Ridiculous Government Honeypot Ever? “Meet The ‘Assassination Market’ Creator Who’s Crowdfunding Murder With Bitcoins”
December 18th, 2013Via: Forbes: As Bitcoin becomes an increasingly popular form of digital cash, the cryptocurrency is being accepted in exchange for everything from socks to sushi to heroin. If one anarchist has his way, it’ll soon be used to buy murder, too. Last month I received an encrypted email from someone calling himself by the pseudonym […]
IBM Sued for Cooperating with NSA Spy Program
December 16th, 2013IBM knows a thing or two about colluding with fascists: IBM and the Holocaust: The Strategic Alliance Between Nazi Germany and America’s Most Powerful Corporation by Edwin Black Via: Reuters: IBM Corp has been sued by a shareholder who accused it of concealing how its ties to what became a major U.S. spying scandal reduced […]
Frenchelon: France Broadens Its Surveillance Power
December 16th, 2013*yawn* How old is the Frenchelon joke? I don’t remember if I first came across it in the 1980s or 1990s. Via: New York Times: For all their indignation last summer, when the scope of the United States’ mass data collection began to be made public, the French are hardly innocents in the realm of […]
