Amtrak Passengers Agree to DEA Searches Without Warrants or Probable Cause
August 31st, 2019It’s hard for passengers to say no because they’re completely clueless about their rights.
Via: The Intercept:
When Perry approaches, it’s hard for passengers to say no.
“Because he told me he was an officer,” the young passenger in Albuquerque later said, explaining why he agreed to the search.
It’s legal for Perry to search people without probable cause, a warrant, or a dog because travelers supposedly realize that they have the right to decline to submit to his searches. Perry and others in his interdiction unit have testified that they receive manifests ahead of time listing the passengers who will be arriving in Albuquerque. The courts have ruled this is also legal — functioning like a helpful tip sheet on whom to question.
Hong Kong: Demonstrators Defy Ban on March
August 31st, 2019Via: BBC:
Hong Kong police have used tear gas, rubber bullets and water cannon to disperse crowds as tens of thousands marched in the city, defying a ban.
Demonstrators lit fires, threw petrol bombs at riot police and attacked the parliament building.
An event to mark five years since Beijing ruled out fully democratic elections was banned in Hong Kong, a special administrative region of China.
On Friday, several key pro-democracy activists and lawmakers were arrested.
The protest movement grew out of rallies against a controversial extradition bill – now suspended – which would have allowed criminal suspects to be sent to mainland China for trial.
It has since become a broader pro-democracy movement in which clashes have grown more violent.
Retrofit Robot Pilot Can Grab Flight Controls, Read Instruments, Take Off, Navigate, Land
August 31st, 2019Does it chat with ATC???
Via: New Scientist:
A robot pilot is learning to fly. It has passed its pilot’s test and flown its first plane, but it has also had its first mishap too.
Unlike a traditional autopilot, the ROBOpilot Unmanned Aircraft Conversion System literally takes the controls, pressing on foot pedals and handling the yoke using robotic arms. It reads the dials and meters with a computer vision system.
China’s Lunar Rover Has Found Something Weird on the Far Side of the Moon
August 31st, 2019Via: Space.com:
China’s Chang’e-4 lunar rover has discovered an unusually colored, ‘gel-like’ substance during its exploration activities on the far side of the moon.
The mission’s rover, Yutu-2, stumbled on that surprise during lunar day 8. The discovery prompted scientists on the mission to postpone other driving plans for the rover, and instead focus its instruments on trying to figure out what the strange material is.
Biohackers Are Pirating a Cheap Version of a Million-Dollar Gene Therapy
August 30th, 2019Via: MIT Technology Review:
Citing the tremendous cost of new drugs, an international group of biohackers say they are creating a knock-off of a million-dollar gene therapy.
The drug being copied is Glybera, a gene therapy that was the world’s most expensive drug when it came on the market in Europe in 2015 with a $1 million per treatment price tag. Glybera was the first gene therapy ever approved to treat an inherited disease.
Now a band of independent and amateur biologists say they have engineered a prototype of a simpler, low-cost version of Glybera, and they plan to call on university and corporate scientists to help them check, improve, and test it on animals.
The group says it will start sharing the materials and describe their activities this weekend at Biohack the Planet, a conference in Las Vegas that hosts citizen scientists, journalists, and researchers for two days of presentations on body implants, biosafety, and hallucinogens.
“This was developed in a shed in Mississippi, a warehouse in Florida, a bedroom in Indiana, and on a computer in Austria,” says Gabriel Licina, a biohacker based in South Bend, Indiana. He says the prototype gene therapy cost less than $7,000 to create.
Investigators Seize Enough Fentanyl to Kill 14 Million People in Massive Drug Bust
August 30th, 2019Via: CBS:
Law enforcement officers in Virginia have seized enough fentanyl to kill 14 million people, busting a massive three-state drug ring as part of what they called “Operation Cookout.” Thirty-five suspects were arrested, and four others are on the run.
How to Teach an Iris Scanner That the Eye It’s Looking at Is Dead
August 29th, 2019Via: IEEE:
Conventional wisdom has held that the iris begins decaying only minutes after death. Thanks to Maciejewicz’s work, we discovered that wisdom to be wrong: If cadavers are kept cool, the eyes can still be used for identification for up to three weeks postmortem. Researchers had also assumed that recognition systems could not accurately identify dead eyes, which means that such systems are now vulnerable to exploitation. So to be completely secure, future generations of iris-recognition systems will therefore need more-advanced detection mechanisms, capable of recognizing dead eyes—otherwise, we could find ourselves in a science-fiction future where people could use someone else’s dead eyes to access information or locations they’re not supposed to. Less fantastical, though, the systems will also need to be flexible enough to adapt in instances where there are changes to an iris due to disease, and precise enough to tell whether the iris in question is a fake.
FBI Studies Two Broken Cameras Outside Cell Where Epstein Died
August 29th, 2019Mmm hmm.
Via: Reuters:
Two cameras that malfunctioned outside the jail cell where financier Jeffrey Epstein died as he awaited trial on sex-trafficking charges have been sent to an FBI crime lab for examination, a law enforcement source told Reuters.
Epstein’s lawyers Reid Weingarten and Martin Weinberg told U.S. District Judge Richard Berman in Manhattan on Tuesday they had doubts about the New York City chief medical examiner’s conclusion that their client killed himself.
The two cameras were within view of the Manhattan jail cell where he was found dead on Aug. 10. A source earlier told Reuters two jail guards failed to follow a procedure overnight to make separate checks on all prisoners every 30 minutes.
He had been taken off suicide watch prior to his death.
The cameras were sent to Quantico, Virginia, site of a major FBI crime lab where agents and forensic scientists analyze evidence.
Cost of U.S. War in Afghanistan: About $1 Trillion
August 29th, 2019Via: BBC:
So, according to the US Department of Defense, the total military expenditure in Afghanistan (from October 2001 until March 2019) was $760bn.
That’s significantly more than the figure given by the Afghan president.
But an independent study carried out by Brown University’s Cost of War Project argues that the official US figures for Afghanistan are a substantial underestimate.
It says they do not include spending on war veterans’ care, money spent on other government departments for war-related activities and the cost of interest on debt incurred to pay for the war.
It estimates the total cost, factoring in these additional elements, is closer to one trillion US dollars.
Sacramento Zombie Apocalypse
August 29th, 2019Via: DailyMail:
‘All we do is lie around, eat ice-cream, have sex, and take drugs,’ said Cali. ‘Man, I love ice-cream.
Carlisle says she needs heroin just to exist. ‘I need it for everything — just to walk and to breathe.
‘I did go to rehab once, she added. ‘In Orangeville I think… or maybe it was somewhere else.’
