Cloud service refers to data storage away from users’ local systems and across the span of dedicated servers meant for this. It is an alternative way of storing data online instead of your local machines. At its earliest, in 1983, CompuServe provided 128 KB of disk space that could be used for files storage to its users. This proved to be crucial despite not being enough.
In today’s world, the storage field is under active development because of potential threats such as loss of data/information, data hacking or masquerading, and other attacks. However, many companies have come forward with their solutions to Cloud storage and data privacy, strengthening and stabilizing their future.
While using any cloud service, note that you cannot upload your data without an internet connection. Furthermore, you will still need an internet connection to either modify or share documents, presentations, spreadsheets, images, audio, video e.t.c with others. Cloud is virtual and provides services to end-users in storage, hosting of apps, or virtualizing any physical space. In today’s world, cloud computing is used by small and large organizations for data storage.
There are three main types of services associated with the cloud, namely, SaaS (Software as a Service) that allows users to access other publicly available clouds of large organizations for storing their data, for instance, Gmail, PaaS (Platform as a Service) for hosting of applications or software on other public clouds, for example, Google App Engine which hosts apps of users, laaS (infrastructure as a Service) for virtualizing any physical machine and availing it to customers to make them get the feel of a real machine.
Based on the upstream Coreboot 4.14 release, Star Labs’ Coreboot 7 open-source firmware is now available for the StarBook Mk V, Star LabTop Mk III, and Star LabTop Mk IV Linux notebooks, along with an updated Coreboot Configurator utility.
This release comes about three months after Coreboot 6 and brings several new features, including a new option to set the maximum charge level as 60, 80, or 100 percent, as well as a new option to set the fan curve as Aggressive, Normal, or Quiet.
Major performance milestones are being hit with new code inbound for Linux, Plasma and GNOME desktops are set to run Wayland on NVIDIA's binary driver, and why the SFC's new GPL fight could have implications for you.
1:22 Linux Innards 36:00 Vibrations from the Ether 52:41 Announcements & Outro
In our Innards section, tablets
And finally, the feedback and a couple of suggestions
Next in our video editing series for the Librem 14, Gardiner Bryant explains why audio is critical in video production, capturing good sound, and post-processing using Audacity, an open source sound editing solution. This video will help those looking to level up their audio and overall production.
We attempt a live production over Starlink, and dig into the secrets of this giant Linux network in space.
I'm announcing the release of the 5.14.15 kernel.
All users of the 5.14 kernel series must upgrade.
The updated 5.14.y git tree can be found at: git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/stable/linux-stable.git linux-5.14.y and can be browsed at the normal kernel.org git web browser: https://git.kernel.org/?p=linux/kernel/git/stable/linux-s...
thanks,
greg k-h
Intel is using their inaugural Intel Innovation virtual event today to formally announce the highly-anticipated 12th Gen Core "Alder Lake" processors. These first desktop processors built on their "Intel 7" process and employ a hybrid architecture will be available in retail channels next week. Today we can talk more about Alder Lake specifications and features while our Linux performance benchmarks and support analysis will come once the Alder Lake review embargo expires next week.
While there have been many Alder Lake leaks in recent weeks/months and a number of features disclosed back during Architecture Day, today marks the official unveil for the next-gen Intel Core processors. This is a very exciting transition as they have now shifted to their Intel 7 manufacturing process, the hybrid architecture provides a combination of high performance and low power cores depending upon needs, and Intel is at the forefront now in delivering DDR5 memory and PCIe 5.0 to the masses. When it comes to performance, Intel claims Alder Lake can deliver up to two times the performance of prior generation processors for content creation workloads. Meanwhile when it comes to the generational performance uplift for the P (Performance) cores it's said to be around 19%.
Microsoft’s stance for decades was that community creation and sharing of communal code (later to be known as free and open source software) represented a direct attack on their business. Their battle with Linux stretches back many years. Back in 2001, former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer famously tarnished Linux “a cancer that attaches itself in an intellectual property sense to everything it touches”. Microsoft also initiated its “Get the Facts” marketing campaign from mid-2003, which specifically criticized Linux server usage, total cost of ownership, security, indemnification and reliability. The campaign was widely criticized for spreading misinformation.
However, in recent years, there has been a partial shift by Microsoft to embrace the open source software paradigm. For example, some of their code is open sourced. Examples include Visual Studio Code, .NET Framework, Atom, and PowerShell. They have also made investments in Linux development, server technology and organizations including the Linux Foundation and Open Source Initiative. They have made acquisitions such as Xamarin to help mobile app development, and GitHub a hugely popular code repository for open source developers. And they have partnered with Canonical, the developers of the popular Ubuntu distro. But many developers remain hugely sceptical about Microsoft and their apparent shift to embrace open source.
This tutorial will only work on Chromebooks with an Intel or AMD CPU (with Linux Apps Support) and not those with an ARM64 architecture CPU.
Here’s how to clean up Flatpak apps to reclaim your precious disk space. Follow along.
Flatpak (like Snap) packages runs in sandbox mode. By design, it takes a considerable amount of disk space for an individual application, even if it is a smaller one. For example, a simple Test editor or a basic image annotator application can take up more than 100+ MB of storage space.
It’s how Flatpak, or even Snap operates fundamentally. It pulls all dependencies for an app and runs independently. The advantage of this design is – you do not need to worry about dependencies, updates. All you need to do is install and run. On the contrary, it takes up huge amount of disk space.
And if you are running Ubuntu, elementary OS or any distribution for longer period, you would be surprised that over time, Flatpak keeps on taking up more space.
Hence, in this guide, we will give you some commands which you can run it by yourself to clean up flatpak apps.
In this tutorial, we will show you how to install Fail2Ban on Debian 11. For those of you who didn’t know, Fail2Ban is an intrusion prevention framework written in the Python programming language. This service will help prevent unwanted logins by banning nefarious IP addresses from gaining access to your server. Whereas, other basic functions are monitor log files, searches for predefined patterns, and temporarily block IP addresses.
This article assumes you have at least basic knowledge of Linux, know how to use the shell, and most importantly, you host your site on your own VPS. The installation is quite simple and assumes you are running in the root account, if not you may need to add ‘sudo‘ to the commands to get root privileges. I will show you through the step-by-step installation of Fail2Ban on a Debian 11 (Bullseye).
There are several service mesh products and projects today, promising simplified connectivity between application microservices, while at the same time offering additional capabilities like secured connections, observability, and traffic management. But as we’ve seen repeatedly over the last few years, the excitement about service mesh has been tempered by practical concerns about additional complexity and overhead. Let’s explore how eBPF allows us to streamline the service mesh, making the service mesh data plane more efficient and easier to deploy.
File sharing, as the act of distributing and providing access to different types of files over the Internet, has become something that everyone is familiar with. The fast development of file-sharing services makes it extremely easy for us to share whatever we need with friends, family, or co-workers. For example, a couple of clicks is enough to instantly share a funny video or picture with someone who is halfway around the world.
One of the most popular services for file sharing and synchronization is Seafile. In this article, you will learn how to integrate Seafile with ONLYOFFICE Docs to create a collaborative file-sharing environment on Linux.
Editing text files directly from the Linux terminal can be tough, especially if you're using a complicated text editor like Vi or Vim. Beginner users have a tough time wrapping their heads around command-line text editors and often find it hard to memorize the key bindings used to perform basic operations.
Even deleting lines in Vi and Vim can be a nerve-wracking job for newcomers. But using a rudimentary tool like a text editor doesn't have to be so hard.
Here's how you can remove one or more lines from a text file using Vi and Vim.
Firefox 93 officially released for all major OS e.g. Linux, Mac OSX, Windows, and Android. The binary package is now available for download for Linux (POSIX) systems, grab the desired one, and enjoy browsing with new features added to it.
OpenNMS is a free and open-source Open Network Management System written in Java. It is a network monitoring application that gathers critical information from local and network hosts using the SNPM protocol. It can be installed on Linux and Windows operating systems and provides a web-based interface to monitor network traffics through a web browser. It offers a rich set of features including, Provisioning, Service Monitoring, Event Management, Charting support and Performance Measurement.
In this post, we will show you how to install OpenNMS on Debian 11.
Zabbix is a free, open-source, popular, and feature-rich IT infrastructure monitoring software developed using PHP language. It is used to monitor networks, servers, applications, services as well as cloud resources. It also supports the monitoring of storage devices, databases, virtual machines, telephony, IT security resources, and much more.
Zabbix is an Open Source, high-level enterprise software designed to monitor and keep track of networks, servers, and applications in real-time. Build in a server-client model, Zabbix can collect different types of data that are used to create historical graphics and output performance or load trends of the monitored targets.
The server has the ability to check standard networking services (HTTP, FTP, SMTP, IMAP, etc) without the need to install extra software on the monitored hosts.
User roles on a Linux operating system are hierarchy-based. The root user sits on the iron throne and is able to control the actions of all other users. It is the administrative/authentication power of this root user that controls the actions of any other user with access to the Linux system.
Here are the two ways to set a date and time on Rocky Linux 8 or AlmaLinux using the command terminal and graphical user interface.
There are many processes on the Linux operating system that requires the correct system date and time. Also, to update the system properly and other processes like cronjobs we must need the up-to-date time & date. However, Linux or any other OS automatically syncs the system time from the server, in case not or you want to change the timezone manually then let’s explore how to do that.
PostgreSQL is one of the best open source solutions for relational database management. So, many developers use it as an alternative to MariaDB or proprietary solutions like Oracle. That’s why, today in this post, you will learn how to install PostgreSQL on Debian 11 quickly and easily.
Kali Linux, previously known as BackTrack Linux, is a Debian-based open-source Linux distribution designed for advanced penetration testing and security auditing. This operating system has many tools for diverse information security undertakings, including penetration testing, reverse engineering, security research, and computer forensics.
Kali Linux is a multi-platform elucidation that information security pros and hobbyists can use for free. It is designed to satisfy the needs of penetration testing and security auditing professionals.
NFS server is also known as Network File System server, was developed by Sun Microsystems in 1984. NFS was designed to share files and folders between Linux/Unix systems. After its initial success, NFS version 2 became public, and then everyone could use this to exchange files.
It is a distributed file system protocol that allows the client computer to access files over the network. The server requires to validate the client computer, and then after successful validation, files and folders are shared amongst each other. However, the data is not encrypted.
Because NFS transfers are not encrypted, it’s not recommended to be used over the internet.
NFS server allows you to mount your local files over a network and remote hosts, to interact with them as they are both mounted locally on the same system. NFS serves the same purpose as SMB(Server Message Block), but it is faster as compared with SMB.
Currently, there are three NFS protocol versions: NFSv2, NFSv3, NFSv4.
The saga of Google's Stadia product has been long, winding, and mostly disappointing. The initial launch of Google's platform, billed as a Netflix-style video game streaming service, was underwhelming and plagued with Obamacare-like rollout issues, failed promises, underperforming adoption rates, and a paltry catalogue of games on the platform. Other than that, the launch of Stadia went off without a hitch.
Long awaited KDE Connect is now available for iPhone (iOS >= 15). Here are the details.
Today we want to introduce the last of the new features we are implementing into the 2.9 release which we have recently finalized.
To demo this new feature, let’s use an example contributed by one of our users. This example is based upon the measurement data from a solar cell. The so-called “incident photon to current efficiency” (IPCE) tells us how many incoming photons are converted into free electrons in the cell. This conversion efficiency, together with the generated current and their dependency on the wavelength of the incoming light, are the usual subjects of studies and optimizations for solar cells.
Consider the example where we want to plot the IPCE and the current density in the same plot and to see their behavior as a function of the wavelength. Your first idea may be to just lay out the curves for the plot like this...
I was visiting the Fedora Council ticket tracker when I noticed this ticket up for discussion. The ticket’s purpose is minor and appears inconsequential. It involves adding some legal text to the Fedora Accounts system. The change is related to Export Administration Regulations (the “EAR”) as maintained by the United States Department of Commerce. And the change is not actually a change, but a clarification of a policy that has always been in effect.
I am opposed to the impact of Export Administration Regulations by the United States as it pertains to free and open source software. I am a strong believer that the impact of these regulations are most harmful to all free & open source software communities at an individual, human level. When I saw this discussion at the Fedora Council level, it offered me an opportunity to reflect on my own feelings about these regulations, and also to share an opinion on how I believe Fedora Linux could truly live up to its certification as a Digital Public Good to ensure a more equitable world.
[...]
Firstly, it creates confusion, doubt, and feelings of ill intent. These laws and regulations are meant to impact governments and nation-states. In a Free & Open Source community such as ours, these regulations impact individual people. Not governments or nation-states. As an example, a Fedora community member, Ahmad Haghighi, was recently permanently removed from the Fedora Community. In a few quick clicks, Ahmad’s legacy in the project was erased. As a precedent, even if someone’s contributions were not “supposed” to be accepted in the first place, it does not sit well with me that any one person’s legacy of contributions can so easily be removed from project records.
Secondly, it challenges the vision and foundations of the Fedora Project. Particularly our vision statement and the Friends Foundation. When I contribute to the Fedora Project, I do not see people as a citizen of this-country or that-country. I see them as my peers and fellow Fedorans, helping meet that shared vision of creating “a world where everyone benefits from free and open source software built by inclusive, welcoming, and open-minded communities.” As an American citizen, I know my country makes such discriminations about large groups of people based only on their nationality, but as a contributor to Free & Open Source communities, I see people by their individual character and intention to be a part of our shared vision. But how can we truly aspire to this vision if we are consciously making deliberate exclusions, even if they make little to no sense in our own context? This geographic restriction policy sits in contrast to the vision and purpose we spell out “on paper”.
Monterail decided they needed a bigger office, and they wanted that office to be smarter, so they turned to Raspberry Pi to make it happen.
It was a real leap of faith because the team couldn’t find a similar Raspberry Pi project quite this big, so they didn’t have much to go on. Spoiler: their courage paid off.
It's almost Halloween, one of my favorite days and party times. This year, I decided to (pumpkin) spice up some of my decorations with automated motion sensing. This spooktacular article shows you how I made them, step by step, from building and wiring to coding. This is not your average weekend project—it takes a lot of supplies and building time. But it's a fun way to play around with Raspberry Pi and get in the spirit of this haunting holiday.
More than ever the market is demanding a new approach for digital products: more and more people around the world want something different, more ethical, more sustainable, with real guarantees about personal data protection.
Four years ago, I wanted to break free from Google and Apple, and therefore we created the “eelo” project, with the simple idea that a different mobile operating system and associated cloud services like email or cloud storage could be possible in this world.
Followed by an amazing community of supporters, contributors and now users, the project progressed quickly, and became a reality by the end of 2018. The same year, we had to suddenly abandon our initial project name for a temporary name: /e/.
Sometimes, temporary things last longer than expected. And despite being hard to pronounce, difficult to search, and largely criticized by many people, /e/ as a brand name had the benefit to be very singular and helped us appear different. In the end it conveyed the idea that we’re doing something special. […]
Nevertheless, as we are reaching more and more people and progressively catching interested from a mainstream audience, we have to introduce a new, strong brand, easier to use, easier to refer to and easier to share with people. The goal of this brand is to have a strong name to call our products, intended to be used by a large number of users in many different countries and cultures.
It took some time, since we had many different candidates, both from internal suggestions and from our community. We wanted something that would both convey our project’s values, and that could be within the same lineage of our initial project name. We also had to secure this new brand making sure it was not already in use in the same field of activity, and by entering a long trademark registration processes.
I'm really glad that we have some very active people in FreeDOS who are working on translating messages in all these programs. There are a few folks who contribute to FreeDOS by translating messages from one language to another and sharing those message files so we can use them in the FreeDOS distribution.
FreeDOS is a small operating system with low memory constraints, so actually our biggest challenge has been technical.
In a more modern system like Linux, you can provide message translation through a service like catgets or gettext. Both are programming libraries where the program says, "I need this string [text] in the user's preferred language," and the library gives the program that string. This is an example of internationalization, by providing translations in different languages.
Slate and Mozilla’s Pocket have extended their ‘Behind The Podcasts’ collaboration, partnering on a series of new Pocket Collections to provide podcast and Pocket fans with even more opportunities to explore the behind-the-scenes stories that inspired some of Slate’s most successful podcasts.
This November, Pocket readers can look forward to all-new collections curated by Slate’s podcast hosts, coinciding with new seasons of One Year, Decoder Ring and the highly anticipated sixth season of Slow Burn, one of the most-popular podcast series in Slate’s portfolio, garnering more than 65M+ downloads since its launch in 2017. The curated Pocket Collections, which offer deep-dive reads, down-the-rabbit-hole research, and commentary straight from the hosts’ notes, are the perfect ‘companion pass’ to round out new episodes of Slate’s fan favorites.
I am Beatriz Busaniche from Argentina, and I have been a free software and human rights activist for 20 years. I’m writing because I am very proud to consider myself a longtime friend of Richard Stallman. He has stayed in my home many times. I have organized many of his conferences here in Argentina, and we have shared events, social gatherings, and political and public activities. In all these years Richard has always behaved in a totally respectful, warm, and generous way to me, my family, and my friends.
Richard has made huge contributions to the world of technology. He laid the foundation for the culture of free software, which has grown into a movement that is crucial to our world today. He has helped us to think critically about what we do and how we do it. Our movement is forever in his debt, and we must acknowledge that we have not met our responsibility to appreciate Richard as a human being.
Those of us who are lucky enough to be well acquainted with him know that he is a sensitive, loving person, with weaknesses and imperfections like anyone. He can make mistakes, just like any of us. Yet, he has an extraordinary capacity for logical thinking, and is able to change his position when presented with clear and reasonable arguments. Sometimes, however, he expresses his ideas in an unusually direct way that may seem strange to some.
As a feminist, I have always worked to challenge stereotypes and over-generalizations about people. I believe that we should be inclusive of those with differences and, above all, fight for justice and the rights of all people.
I feel that Richard has been treated unfairly in recent months, and I am deeply ashamed for not having raised my voice in his defense more firmly before this.
I am happy to announce we have released the Qt 6.2.1 today.
It's been just shy of one month since Qt 6.2 debuted as the first Qt6 Long-Term Support (LTS) release and ported many of the remaining modules over from Qt5.
Pyston as the alternative Python implementation open-sourced originally by Dropbox is forming ambitious plans for a bright future.
While Dropbox continued developing Pyston publicly from 2014 to 2017, they stopped supporting it with having moved their performance-sensitive code to other languages. But the original developers then restarted work on it and released Pyston 2.0 in 2020.
Pyston 2.0 was made closed-source along with the follow-on 2.1 release but then Pyston 2.2 this year returned it to being open-source. Then in August it was announced the Pyston developers joined Anaconda to continue their work on this high performance Python implementation.
We’ve spent some time recently thinking about the future of Pyston, our faster implementation of Python, and wanted to share what’s on our mind. For updates please check out our wiki.
Phillip appeared: I see you’re a modern married man. How can you tell? Your clothes are wrinkled. That could be true for a bachelor. No, they pay for wash-and-fold by the bag. They could be poor. No, vanity is totality, appearance obligation, they laundromat it themselves, you machine wash at home and get brainwiped from drying. I hang it on a line outside. Yes, except when you forget because listening is required, you wear the wrinkled badge of courage of the modern feminist man. Sometimes I rebel. Harmlessly, when your socks mismatch. What should I do? As you are, why add more suffering? I see: say nothing and drink alone unseen. Its best, love disguised as peace. The indeterminate illusion of eternity is finite even when you see through it. Enjoy, why not?
I want a dinner of sautéed mushrooms and Veuve Clicquot, cioppino and Pouilly-Fuissé, Renoir and Chateau Margaux, Mozart at midnight. Breakfast eggs fried over bacon at dawn’s riverbank sandbar campfire by the hauled out canoes, fresh coolness beckoning another paddle down the shimmering burbling ribbon to light’s wide horizon, somewhere beyond nightfall, behind the thrumming of crickets, prophesying.
It has become a ubiquitous internet ad, with versions popping up everywhere from Facebook and LinkedIn to smaller sites like Jobvertise: Airport shuttle driver wanted, it says, offering a job that involves picking up passengers for 35 hours a week at an appealing weekly pay rate that works out to more than $100,000 a year.
But airports aren't really dangling six-figure salaries for shuttle drivers amid some sudden resurgence in air travel. Instead, the ads are cybercriminals’ latest attempt to steal people’s identities and use them to commit fraud, according to recent warnings from the FBI, the Federal Trade Commission and cybersecurity firms that monitor such threats. The U.S. Secret Service, which investigates financial crimes, also confirmed that it has seen a “marked increase” in sham job ads seeking to steal people’s personal data, often with the aim of filing bogus unemployment insurance claims.
Paris—As an early evening drizzle enveloped the Stalingrad neighborhood of northeastern Paris, 22-year-old Léo Bewa and a dozen other activists gathered outside a public housing complex to knock on doors. They planned to register residents to vote, but the main reason for their organizing was to talk about the presidential campaign of Jean-Luc Mélenchon, the left-populist from the party La France Insoumise, or France Unbowed, making his third consecutive bid for the Ãâ°lysée Palace.
The identification of Alexander came together when the sheriff's department teamed up with the DNA Doe Project, a nonprofit that uses genetic information to locate relatives of dead people who have not been identified. The organization compared the DNA profile from the unidentified victim's remains to profiles on a genealogy website to find potential relatives. That led it to Alexander's family, and Alexander's mother and half-brother provided their DNA for comparison.
“They are stealing our present. The UPR is not for sale,” read a large banner at the gates of the oldest and largest of the 11 campuses that make up the University of Puerto Rico system. Early in the morning on Monday, October 18, students gathered to join the protests in front of Puerto Rico’s Capitol in San Juan, holding colorful signs: “They violated our past”; “They are stealing our present”; “They are mortgaging our future.” This story was produced for Student Nation, a program of The Nation Fund for Independent Journalism dedicated to highlighting the best of student journalism. For more Student Nation, check out our archive or learn more about the program here. StudentNation is made possible through generous funding from The Puffin Foundation. If you’re a student and you have an article idea, please send pitches and questions to [email€ protected]
For [ke4mcl], this whole cassette craze of late is not a new discovery so much as it is a personal nostalgia machine. Since [ke4mcl] sees a lot of basic questions go unanswered, they made an incredible beginner’s guide to all things cassette deck. This concise wealth of information covers everything from terminology to operation, basic maintenance like repairing the belt and lubricating the motor, and appropriate cleaning methods for the various parts. Yep, we’re pretty sure this covers everything but the pencil winding technique, which you probably already knew about.
Members of Congress today are introducing a law that would establish the most sweeping safety rules for booster seats in more than two decades after determining that the makers of the car seats misled parents about their risks and endangered children’s lives.
The new legislation, called the Booster Seat Safety Act, was prompted by a ProPublica investigation last year. The act’s chief sponsors — Reps. Raja Krishnamoorthi, D-Ill., and Katie Porter, D-Calif. — say it will address gaping holes in federal regulations that have allowed booster seat manufacturers to make up their own side-impact crash tests and decide what passes.
The Food and Drug Administration's independent advisory panel on vaccine safety unanimously approved the Pfizer-BioNTech Covid-19 vaccine for children ages 5 to 11 on Tuesday, paving the way for nearly all school-aged students in the U.S. to have protections from the deadly virus available to them in the coming weeks and months.
With just one abstention, the advisory panel voted 17-0 to approve the vaccine for younger children following a thorough review of data provided by the drug makers and outside review.
Ask any nurse and they will tell you: dental, vision and hearing care are fundamental aspects of health care. And yet right now, West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin is a major impediment to finalizing the Build Back Better reconciliation bill in Congress, including a Medicare expansion plan that is wildly popular.
Then came the global COVID-19 pandemic.€ Like the nuclear fallout anticipated in Nevil Shute’s On the Beach, the menace had to eventually head down under and do its bit of gathering.€ But there was fierce resistance in the country.€ The lockdown formula became the policy de jour and there was no greater example of this than Melbourne.
In 2021, the Herald Sun would look with envy across the pond to note that Auckland in New Zealand has taken the honours of the EIU’s essentially irrelevant assessment.€ Melbourne had suffered a slump, slumming in eighth spot.€ The EIU sternly noted that, “The pandemic has caused huge volatility in our biannual liveability index, which ranks 140 cities across five areas: stability, health care, education, culture, and environment, and infrastructure.”€ But Melbourne’s Lord Mayor Sally Capp, despite noting the “devastating impact” of lockdowns on the city, could still brightly note that “we remain one of the 10 most liveable cities in the world”.
Chatting about the week's .NET news leads us into a blue-tinted tale of woe. When Microsoft taketh, they also giveth. But is it enough?
My husband and I had relocated to a new city and had been renting for two and a half years. We were finally ready to buy our own place and stop throwing money away on rent, and we had a deadline — the end of our lease. But, unfortunately, right at the time we started to look last year, the housing market started going absolutely bonkers.
Very few houses on that market were what we were looking for, and everything was moving so quickly that houses were selling before they even hit the market. It was an exciting time, but also really frantic. We really felt the pressure. We knew we had a deadline so once we found something, we just needed to move. It felt like there was no room for error or even time to process.
Invasive searches of people's phones at border crossings and international airports have become standard operating procedure for US border control agencies. The usual justifications have been made: national security and preventing contraband from crossing the border.
The use of automatic license plate readers by law enforcement has steadily increased over the past decade. The theory is a never ending documentation of vehicle movements results in more solved crimes and recovered stolen vehicles. Assertions about law enforcement efficiency have driven other tech acquisitions, ranging from repurposed war gear like Stingray devices to facial recognition software.
When considering this concept, Edward Snowden’s name comes to mind. Readers will recall that Snowden was an NSA contractor when he discovered that that agency had collected personal information on masses of people around the world and in particular on those in the US. The Constitution (remember that quaint founding document from the revolutionary history of the US?) protects those in the US from unreasonable searches and seizures of our personal information in the Fourth Amendment and establishes our right of free expression that is enshrined in the First Amendment. At least that is what some learned in eight-grade civics class.
Following the Vietnam War era, the US Congress limited the government’s ability to pry into the lives of those in the US. That period, in the late 1970s, was the high point of reining in the government’s ability to spy on those in the US without a warrant and further limited the government’s ability to conduct “dirty tricks’ and sabotage of individuals and groups, as it had done through the FBI’s counterintelligence (COINTELPRO) spying program.
Fortunately, people around the world are fighting back. A growing number of communities have banned government use of face recognition. As to business use, many communities are looking to a watershed Illinois statute, which requires businesses to get opt-in consent before extracting a person’s faceprint. EFF is proud to support laws like these.
Let’s begin with the ways that face recognition harms us. Then we’ll turn to solutions.
Face recognition violates our€ human€ right€ to€ privacy. Surveillance camera networks have flooded our public spaces. Face recognition technologies are more powerful by the day. Taken together, these systems can quickly, cheaply, and easily ascertain where we’ve been, who we’ve been with, and what we’ve been doing. All based on a unique marker that we cannot change or hide: our own faces.
But to win a lawsuit accusing the company of misleading investors, regulators would have to prove that executives had intended to hide or lie about problems. Regulators would also have to prove that the information revealed by Ms. Haugen, or turned up in an investigation, could have changed trading or voting decisions by shareholders if it had been shared.
It would be even more difficult to hold top executives personally responsible. Regulators would have to demonstrate that Mr. Zuckerberg or other executives had explicit knowledge that Facebook was hiding or lying about information that could sway investors.
Our new paper turns to Kenya’s Data Protection Act to lay the groundwork for a truly rights-centric approach to data protection in Kenya.
The Supreme Court has pronounced a judgment regarding the use of Pegasus, constituting a committee of technical experts to examine the allegations of unauthorised surveillance using the Pegasus spyware. The committee of technical experts is monitored by Supreme Court Justice R. V. Raveendran (retd.) who will be assisted by Mr Alok Joshi, a former IPS officer, and Dr. Sandeep Oberoi. The committee has been directed to submit its report expeditiously and the matter will be taken up 8 weeks from 27th October, 2021. IFF has provided legal assistance to two petitioners - Mr Rupesh Kumar Singh and Ms Ipsa Shatakshi. Mr Arvind Datar, Senior Advocate, represented them before the Supreme Court.
[...]
The Supreme Court pronounced its decision on 27th October 2021. Considering the importance of protection of journalistic sources for press freedom, and the potential chilling effect snooping techniques may have, the Court constituted a committee of technical experts to examine the allegations of unauthorised surveillance using the Pegasus Spyware. The committee’s functioning will be overseen by Justice R. V. Raveendran (retd.), former Judge, Supreme Court of India. Mr. Alok Joshi, former IPS officer, and Dr. Sandeep Oberoi, Chairman, International Organisation of Standardisation and the International Electro€-Technical Commission, have been tasked with assisting the overseeing judge. The Technical Committee, whose bios the Court provided, shall comprise of: (Paragraph 60):
“1. Dr. Naveen Kumar Chaudhary, Professor (Cyber Security and Digital Forensics) and Dean, National Forensic Sciences University, Gandhinagar, Gujarat. Dr. Chaudhary has over two decades of experience as an academician, cyber security enabler and cyber security expert. He specializes in cyber security policy, network vulnerability assessment and penetration testing.
2. Dr. Prabaharan P., Professor (School of Engineering), Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham, Amritapuri, Kerala. He has two decades of experience in computer science and security areas. His areas of interest are malware detection, critical infrastructural security, complex binary analysis, AI and machine learning. He has many publications in reputed journals.
3. Dr. Ashwin Anil Gumaste, Institute Chair Associate Professor (Computer Science and Engineering), Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay, Maharashtra. He has been granted 20 US patents and has published over 150 papers and authored 3 books in his field. He has received several National awards including the Vikram Sarabhai Research Award (2012) and Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar Prize for Science and Technology (2018). He has also held the position of Visiting Scientist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, USA.”
Amongst other things, the Court has directed the Committee to enquire, investigate, and determine whether the Pegasus Spyware was acquired by the Union Government or any State Government, and whether the spyware was used on phones or other devices of the citizens of India to access stored data, eavesdrop on conversation, intercept information and/or any other purpose [Paragraph 61(A)]. The Committee has also been asked to make recommendations regarding enactment or amendment to existing law around surveillance to secure the right to privacy as well as regarding establishment of a mechanism for citizens to raise grievances on suspicion of illegal surveillance of orders [Paragraph 61(B)]. In order to achieve these ends, the Committee has been authorised to devise its own procedure, conduct investigation as it deems fit, take statements of any person in connection with the enquiry, and crucially ‘call for records of any authority or individual’ (Paragraph 62).
Felony murder is a truly bizarre artifact of the American justice system. It's simply not enough that there are thousands of laws that can be used to charge people who have allegedly broken them. But felony murder (and its offshoots, which include other crimes like manslaughter) allows prosecutors to charge people for crimes they didn't commit.
We look at the attempted coup in Sudan, where the military, led by General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan overthrew the transitional government Monday, detaining Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok and other political leaders. As protesters flooded the streets of Khartoum demanding the government be handed back to the civilians, Sudanese soldiers opened fire on them, killing at least 10 and wounding scores more. The United Nations has condemned the coup, and the United States has suspended a $700 million emergency aid package for Sudan. “No one is in support of this coup,” says Walaa Salah, human rights lawyer and activist who attended the ongoing protests and spoke with Democracy Now! by phone from Khartoum on Tuesday. “Military rule is a regression.” We also speak with Isma’il Kushkush, a Sudanese American journalist who lived in and reported from Khartoum for years, who says, for most Sudanese citizens, “the important thing is to see the transfer into a full civilian government, to see elections.”
All tourists in North Korea, which includes me at the end of 2016, are accompanied by state-sanctioned guides. Their job, ostensibly, is not to monitor you but, much like every other tour guide, to show you all the best sights and make sure you stick to the itinerary. Inevitably, you are also shepherded around a very select portion of the country: Most Western tourists only see Pyongyang, the nation’s capital, where the elite live; Chinese day-trippers usually see only Sinuiju, a border city accessible via a bridge to the neighboring Chinese city of Dandong.
One month after the Afghanistan pullout, it is still unclear whether we witnessed the beginning of a series of military withdrawals—as part of Biden’s proclaimed end to the era of regime change wars—or if Afghanistan will remain a mere one-off.
As an eyewitness, I can recall the events of January 6th in Washington as if they were yesterday. The crowds of angry loyalists storming the building while overwhelmed security guards gave way. The slavishly loyal vice-president who would, the president hoped, restore him to power. The crush of media that seemed confused, almost overwhelmed, by the crowd’s fury. The waiter who announced that the bar had run out of drinks and would soon be closing…
Early yesterday, Rolling Stone published an explosive report alleging that two of the people who helped plan the January 6 “Stop the Steal” protests had extensive planning meetings with members of Congress or their staff. These two organizers appear to be cooperating with the January 6 Select Committee, the congressional task force investigating the Capitol attack, which is more than I can say for most of the Trump cronies who actually served in government.
The reader will probably remember Abbottabad 2011, the bin Laden raid, the showdown. Obama’s Counterterrorism chief, John Brennan, told the press Navy SEALs were in a firefight with UBL, and that “while bin Laden had vowed to go down fighting, in his last moments alive the master terrorist hid behind a woman.” As if anticipating criticism for killing the one guy who might have known about future 9/11s, Brennan added that UBL would have been taken had they been able to. He soon walked these details back. A video feed of the raid was said to have gone awry, leaving the narrative to hearsay accounts, and soon several different versions of what happened at the ‘showdown’ were reported. SEALs reached out to the public, 60 Minutes interviewed raiders, the “journalistic” Zero Dark Thirty was made, with the “cooperation” of the White House. There is even the local Pakistani media coverage that told a different tale. But it’s still uncertain what actually took place that early morning in Abbottabad.
But there’s another version of those events, KBL–Kill Bin Laden: A Novel Based on True Events by novelist JohnWeisman, which maintains close access to SEAL team members and Weisman, a writer praised by Seymour Hersh, has written about them before. Some facts can only be related as fiction rather than fact, and are truer as a result. In KBL, Weisman gives an account of ‘what actually happened’ at Abbottabad that is disturbing and riveting. SEALs coming up the staircase, facing UBL’s slightly ajar door, we get:
U.S. federal investigators today raided the Florida offices of PAX Technology, a Chinese provider of point-of-sale devices used by millions of businesses and retailers globally. KrebsOnSecurity has learned the raid is tied to reports that PAX’s systems may have been involved in cyberattacks on U.S. and E.U. organizations.
The first shift in society that must be noted is that we got five years closer to the end of it. We went backward, not forward, on climate change and it seems that all leaders across the world lack the urgency to save us from this crisis. It is possible that technology will develop to mitigate the crisis for some, but this quest for a technological future largely remains a satire, with billionaires flying to space thinking they are the solution rather than the problem. The only thing that is delaying the end of humanity is indigenous resistance. In the past 10 years, these communities have stopped an astounding 25% of U.S./Canadian emissions through protest. Their reward is further genocide upon their communities. Go figure. The solution to the end of the world is not technocratic capitalism, which will still use every resource for private profits until we run out of them.
The second change in society is a rather surprising one for the globalist neoliberal era. This is a return of nationalist sentiment. Joe Biden continues Donald Trump’s strategy of mobilizing an idea of America. Joe Biden decided to end a forever war and this appeared to largely be because Trump promised to. Biden was honest enough that he blamed the Afghan people for the war on his way out the door. The Pentagon budget went up again, with eyes to China, with Biden echoing Trump’s America First rhetoric. Similarly, Biden has successfully implemented a brutal nationalist immigration policy where Trump never could do cleanly. When it comes to China, where Trump’s nationalist tariffs failed, Biden has upped the ante, appearing to threaten war with China over Taiwan. Biden has been unwilling to deliver on his own campaign promises, butchering negotiations on his signature Build Back Better plan.. This plan was its own version of nationalism embodied in rebuilding America. As it was stripped it was revealed that it would also increase emissions, and therefore would only be fleeting relief for the working class. Remember that Trump ran a campaign on infrastructure but only became interested in building a wall. Biden is a “better’ Trump.
Powell believed he could deal with the CIA, just as he believed he had dealt with Vice President Cheney’s efforts to prepare his speech.€ The Cheney draft of a speech, written by his chief of staff, Lewis “Scooter” Libby, was a total distortion, and Powell ignored it.€ But Powell was no match for the manipulation of CIA director George Tenet and deputy director John McLaughlin.€ They lied to him, and he never forgave them.
Tenet and McLaughlin played key roles from September 2002 to March 2003 in manufacturing intelligence to support a decision to go to war.€ They gave deceitful briefings to various congressional committees; they sponsored a specious National Intelligence Estimate in October 2002; they instigated an unclassified “White Paper” on the basis of the estimate to distribute on Capitol Hill before the vote to authorize force; and they assisted Cheney’s desires.€ Powell knew that Cheney had made numerous trips to the CIA to make sure that the intelligence would corroborate Bush’s decision to go to war.
Officials in Poland said Monday that two soldiers were lightly hurt when a group of some 60 migrants tried to force their way across the border from Belarus.
The Border Guards office said the troops — who have been deployed to help protect the European Union’s eastern border from growing migration pressure — were treated at a hospital for facial injuries following the events Sunday near the village of Usnarz Gorny.
They said in a statement that the migrants were throwing stones and wielding branches. That part of the border is in a dense forest that also includes bogs. Most of the border with Belarus runs along the Bug river.
A video showing men trying to break the razor wire border fence with a branch and helmeted Polish troops watching from nearby was posted on the Border Guards website.
Over the weekend, the Telegraph (not the most trustworthy or reliable in a batch of UK news organizations that have long had issues with accuracy in reporting) claimed that the latest (and most high profile) Facebook whistleblower, Frances Haugen, was prepared to come out against encryption. This (quite rightly) raised the hackles of multiple encryption experts. As people were getting pretty worked up about it, the Telegraph (silently, and without notice) changed the headline of the piece (from "Facebook whistleblower warns ‘dangerous’ encryption will aid espionage by hostile nations" to "Facebook whistleblower warns company's encryption will aid espionage by hostile nations") as well as the actual text of the story, to suggest a slightly more nuanced (but still not great) view -- effectively saying she supported encryption, but was concerned that Facebook would use encryption as a "see no evil" kind of blindfold to problems on its platform.
Upon the release of the latest dire report from the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (8/9/21), the Washington Post (8/10/21) published a strongly worded editorial under the headline, “Climate Doubters Lose One of Their Last Remaining Arguments.”
On Sunday, COP26, the 26th United Nations climate change summit, will kick off in Glasgow, Scotland, in what John Kerry, the U.S. special envoy on climate, has called humanity’s “last best chance” to curb the climate catastrophe. Already, politicians and major corporations, including oil and gas producers, are hard at work promoting the idea that the 2015 Paris Agreement’s goals can be met if the financial world coalesces around “net-zero” climate initiatives.
But talk about “net zero” has been met with skepticism by many of those on the frontlines of climate change and those advocating on their behalf. A report issued today by advocacy groups Corporate Accountability, Corporate Europe Observatory, Global Forest Coalition, and Friends of the Earth International takes a look at climate strategies marketed by a half-dozen major polluters and finds that the plans come up lacking because of their heavy reliance on “net zero” strategies that presume that the institutions can continue emitting greenhouse gases as long as they are someday actively removed from the atmosphere.€
For the past several decades, Noam Chomsky has been one of the most forceful and persuasive voices confronting injustice, inequity, and the threat posed by human-caused climate chaos to civilization and the Earth. I was eager to know Professor Chomsky’s views on the roots of our current dire predicament and on humanity’s prospects for emerging from this crisis into a livable future. He very graciously agreed to speak with me by way of a video chat. The text here is an abridged version of a conversation we had on October 1, 2021.
Professor Chomsky, now 92, is the author of numerous best-selling political works, translated into scores of languages. His critiques of power and advocacy on behalf of the political agency of the common person have inspired generations of activists and organizers. He has been institute professor emeritus at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology since 1976. His most recent books are€ Consequences of Capitalism: Manufacturing Discontent and Resistance, with Marv Waterstone, and€ Climate Crisis and the Global Green New Deal: The Political Economy of Saving the Planet,with Robert Pollin and C.J. Polychroniou.
As the climate emergency wreaks havoc and displaces growing numbers of vulnerable people around the globe, the world's richest countries and biggest greenhouse gas emitters are responding in a dangerous manner—by prioritizing border militarization over€ efforts to mitigate fossil fuel pollution and adapt to a hotter planet.
"This militarization of borders is partly rooted in national climate security strategies that since the early 2000s have overwhelmingly painted migrants as 'threats' rather than victims of injustice."
Thirteen thousand feet high on the far side of the Himalaya mountains, we have entered the past and the future at the same time. We are a medical expedition and also a pilgrimage, consisting of doctors, nurses, Buddhist clerics, supernumeraries like me, and a large staff of guides, muleteers, and camp tenders. We are bound for the isolated villages of Upper Dolpo, a remote region of northwestern Nepal, land of the snow leopard—both the actual animal and the eponymous nonfiction classic by Peter Matthiessen. We are traveling the same trails Matthiessen walked in 1973.
Countries' current climate pledges put the world "on track for a catastrophic global temperature rise" of about 2.7€°C, United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres warned Tuesday, calling a new report released ahead of a key summit "another thundering wake-up call."
"The era of half-measures and hollow promises must end."
With tight races€ for Governor in two states,€ Vote Climate U.S. PAC€ is issuing their first-ever,€ Gubernatorial Voter’s Guide€ in Virginia and New Jersey for the elections on Tuesday, November 2, 2021, rating candidates on climate change. There is a major divide between candidates on climate change in both critical Gubernatorial races. Climate-action voters could make a difference if they turn out and vote climate.
Over the past decade, nearly 1,500 investors and institutions controlling almost $40 trillion in assets have committed to divesting from fossil fuels—a remarkable achievement that climate campaigners applauded Tuesday, while warning that further commitments and action remain crucial.
"Divestment has helped rub much of the shine off what was once the planet's dominant industry. If money talks, $40 trillion makes a lot of noise."
Climate campaigners are cheering Wednesday in response to the news that Dutch pension fund ABP—the fifth-largest in the world—is divesting its assets from fossil fuel producers.
"This is really fantastic, after all these years of campaigning, we finally succeeded," said€ Liset Meddens, director at Fossielvrij NL, calling the development "a huge victory for the climate, human rights, and all life on Earth."
Prime Minister Scott Morrison's government on Tuesday announced Australia's plan for net-zero emissions by 2050—a plan that includes no further ambition toward 2030 targets, relies on unproven carbon capture technology, and does not phase out fossil fuels.
“We need to slash emissions today, tomorrow, this year, and this decade—not in 2050."
Rich countries have put the world on the brink of climate catastrophe. They have gotten away with decades of inaction on reducing emissions, and on providing finance for the world's poorer countries to do the same and to support their frontline communities in coping with increasingly severe climate impacts.
Wildfire impacted folks mostly from Chico in Butte County, the North Central California region hard hit by climate fires, will carpool together to paint a giant street mural with paint made from wildfire ashes and charcoal from burned trees on their properties. We will protest against the financiers of fossil fuels and PG&E for the last big chance before Cop26 starts on Halloween day.€ On October 29 in San Francisco in front of BlackRock HQ, the largest financial investor in fossil fuel projects and major shareholder of PG&E is the perfect target to make our stand to #ProtectTheSacred. Their profitable investments set our communities on fire, killed my neighbors, and wrecked lives.€
The story went viral and forced the Federal Reserve to offer a preposterously lame excuse for what was obviously a desire by Powell to reduce his exposure to the stock market, despite his having access to more insider information than any other human on the planet.
The same day that Kuttner’s story ran, Mike Derby, a reporter for the Wall Street Journal, wrote that a Fed representative had characterized the large Vanguard sale as “for family expenses.”
U.S. House progressives led by Reps. Pramila Jayapal, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and Cori Bush dug in their heels Tuesday as right-wing Democrats attempted to salvage a $1.2 trillion infrastructure bill while sidelining the more ambitious Build Back Better package championed by the party's left wing and President Joe Biden until after the weaker bipartisan legislation is passed.
"It's not enough for me. And there are more of us."
Yet, this is precisely what we are seeing, as during the month of October, over 100,000 workers have either threatened to strike or actually have walked off the job to demand wage increases, improvements to their work conditions, and basic human dignity.
Dubbed ‘striketober’ by activists and pundits alike, this strike wave is occurring across the country, in various industries.
Amid of wave of worker walkouts that supporters are collectively calling "Striketober," McDonald's employees in at least 12 U.S. cities took to the streets Tuesday to raise concerns about how the fast food giant has handled sexual harassment and to demand a union.
"No matter what McDonald's says, not much has changed for workers like me."
"The billionaire wealth tax merits an extra push since it is the most powerful tool on the table for tackling the wealth inequality that is undermining our economy and threatening our democracy."
While we don’t know what sort of Build Back Better bill Democrats will end up passing, we do know that it will be a shadow of President Biden’s original plan. The core of the climate agenda is out. Free community college is out. The extension of Medicare to cover vision, hearing, and dental is under threat. Senator Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.) perversely seems intent on killing the plan to lower prescription drug prices, a reform even Republican voters support. Instead of the “Roosevelt moment” Biden promised, we’ve suffered another tawdry chapter about the power of deep-pocketed interests and the pervasive corruption of our politics.
Democratic leadership advised House progressives behind closed doors Monday night that they better start acting like they are getting a major win even if the reality is that President Joe Biden's signature domestic infrastructure plan seems on the verge of "being gutted beyond recognition" thanks to an aggressive assault by corporate lobbyists and the obstructionism of a small handful of right-wing lawmakers within the party.
"If we don't act like we are winning, the American people won't believe it either," House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) told Democrats during a private meeting, according to Politico.
Last weekend, Representative Conor Lamb, a frontline Democrat from Pennsylvania who’s running for the Senate in 2022, vowed to support carbon-free energy payments, a key climate provision Senator Joe Manchin is currently trying to strip from Democrats’ social spending package. Lamb officially jumped in the race in August to replace retiring Republican Senator Pat Toomey, in what is expected to be one of the most contentious contests in next year’s midterm elections.
As congressional leadership pushes Democrats to "act like we are winning" even as a few corporate-backed party members and business lobbyists water down the Build Back Better bill, Senate Budget Committee Chair Bernie Sanders reiterated Tuesday that the package must expand Medicare and include reforms to lower prescription drug prices.
"Congress must finally have the courage to stand up to the greed of Big Pharma."
U.S. Senate Budget Committee Chair Bernie Sanders plans to deliver a live, online address Tuesday night arguing that "we must end the greed of Big Pharma."
The speech—scheduled for 8:00 pm ET at live.berniesanders.com—comes as Sanders (I-Vt.) and other progressives in Congress are fighting for a Build Back Better package that allows Medicare to negotiate with the pharmaceutical industry for lower prescription drug prices and expands the federal healthcare program to cover dental, hearing, and vision services.
Progressives are fuming amid reports that right-wing Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin is€ pushing his party to weaken or remove the€ reconciliation bill's proposed fee on methane pollution, even as scientists warn that humanity's fate depends on rapidly slashing emissions of the€ potent greenhouse gas.
"As anyone with a leaky roof will tell you, making sufficient investments early on is key to avoiding catastrophic costs down the line."
What have we instead? Joe Manchin of Virginia, a once-little-known-senator Democratic senator essentially holding the Democratic Party hostage. He is also rejecting the purported will – not to forget the needs– of 80% of Americans who approve of the most progressive, far-reaching program drawn up by legislators in two generations.
Manchin is as pig-headed, as resolute, as overconfident as any Republican. And he’s usurped Harris’s role as the clinching vote. (His party can’t handle him or his Arizona cohort Kyrsten Sinema.)
As activists with the Sunrise Movement confronted Sen. Joe Manchin in Washington, D.C. Tuesday—their seventh day of a hunger strike for climate justice—the leader of the youth-led green group shot down a claim by the fossil fuel-funded West Virginia Democrat that the United States leads the world in tackling the planetary emergency.
"If the U.S. doesn't pass massive climate action this fall, it is too late. This is one of our last chances."
On October 27, the High Court of Justice in the United Kingdom will hear the Crown Prosecution Service argue on behalf of the United States government that a lower court improperly blocked the U.S. from extraditing WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange.
[Editor’s Note: To mark the 20th anniversary of the rise of the American security state after the September 11th attacks, The Dissenter continues a retrospective on this transformation in policing and government.]
Ahead of the US appeal hearing on the extradition of Julian Assange Amnesty International’s Secretary General has called on US authorities to drop the charges against him and the UK authorities not to extradite him but release him immediately.
We look at how the tragic shooting death of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins during the filming of “Rust” last Thursday on a set in New Mexico is drawing attention to cost-cutting decisions and overall safety in the film industry. Yahoo News is reporting the gun that killed Hutchins had been used by crew members just hours beforehand for live-ammunition target practice. The film’s lead actor and producer Alec Baldwin later shot the revolver after he was reportedly handed it by the first assistant director, David Halls, who told him it was a “cold gun,” meaning it was not loaded with live ammunition. Halls was fired in 2019 from his position as assistant director on the movie “Freedom’s Path” after a gun “unexpectedly discharged” and injured a crew member. All of this happened after some of the unionized IATSE below-the-line crew members had walked off the set of “Rust” earlier on the day of the shooting to protest their housing, payment and working conditions. New Mexico is a “right to work” state, so producers were able to hire nonunion replacements and continue working on the film. We speak with Dutch Merrick, prop master and armorer for over 25 years and past president of IATSE Local 44 Property Craftspersons, Hollywood, who notes, “Hollywood handles firearms every single day,” and calls the process “carefully regulated.” Despite safety protocol and expertise, he says, Hollywood crews are getting “worked to death” with 80- to 100-hour workweeks, which he suggests played into the accidental shooting.
Today marks the 20th anniversary of the US Patriot Act. This legislation, rightfully, has long been critiqued for sweeping in unprecedented government surveillance. The anniversary is an opportunity to also reckon with how the Patriot Act distorted our democracy’s checks and balances—and what needs to be done to realign them.
People respected him so they’d ask about the pain or discomfort they were experiencing or seeing in their children or babies. My father loved to help people, and oftentimes people were worried because they didn’t know, “how bad is it?” They found his expertise reassuring.
Everyone knows that two aspirin will not cure everything, and they aren’t a diagnostic tool, but it is a troubleshooting step; using nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs to respond to minor aches and pains is like unplugging your router or modem when your internet is not working.
Elliot understood how intellectual property could be misused to shut down curiosity, silence artists, and inhibit research—and how open access policies, open licensing, and a more nuanced and balanced interpretation of copyright could reverse those trends. A committed copyleft activist, he led campaigns against patent trolls and fought for open access to research. He campaigned globally for freedom of expression and access to knowledge, and his powerful articles helped define many of these issues for a global community of digital rights activists.
This photo was taken shortly before Elliot went to speak on top of a truck at a Stop SESTA/FOSTA rally in Oakland.
Elliot’s formidable activism touched upon every aspect of EFF’s work. In his early days with us, he continued the work that he began at Creative Commons campaigning for the late Palestinian-Syrian activist, technologist, and internet volunteer Bassel Khartabil. He also ran a successful campaign for Colombian student Diego Gomez, fighting against that country’s steep copyright infringement laws and advocating for open access and academic freedom. Following the same values, Elliot spearheaded EFF’s Reclaim Invention campaign urging universities to protect their inventions from patent trolls. He went on to help steer our campaign to get the FCC to restore net neutrality rules, framing the issue as a matter of free speech and calling on “Team Internet” to join him in the fight. In all of these efforts and more, Elliot brought a natural sense of how to build and nurture community around a shared cause.€
A few weeks ago, the world noticed that Italy was about to “bring in the strictest COVID-19 measures in Europe”. Starting on October 15th, that is, Italy “would become the first European country to require the so-called green pass - the digital or paper proof of vaccination, immunity or a negative test in the past 48 hours - in all places of work, both private and public.”
[...]
On one hand, both Italians and foreign visitors are safe. It’s pretty unlikely that they will bump into Hitler in any public place in Italy. On the other, there are two classes of concrete problems here.
One is public health, and paradoxically it may be the smaller one: most places here do ask to show Green Passes, but almost none actually verifies that name and age on a Green Pass match the person who shows it. So yes, anybody infected could sneak without getting caught into many public spaces, with those cards.
That may not be a lot of people. The No-vax, no-green-pass crowd is a noisy but dwindling minority in Italy, not to mention that some of them are dumb enough to make Green Passes the last of their problems.
The main problems are that first, those fake passes are valid everywhere in Europe, not just Italy, and it seems similar passes are available in Poland and Russia. Second, there is almost the same thing I mentioned months ago.
It was the longest delay in staffing U.S. telecom agencies in Presidential history, but a White House announcement states the administration will promote interim boss Jessica Rosenworcel to be permanent FCC boss, while appointing former Tom Wheeler advisor and consumer advocate Gigi Sohn to fill the third empty Democratic Commissioner seat. Sohn played a major role in both the crafting of net neutrality rules (since demolished by telecom sector lobbyists during the Trump era) and the FCC's broadband privacy rules (also since demolished by telecom sector lobbyists during the Trump era).
"There's no time to waste and so much to get done."
"Finally! Now let's get this agency back to work."
Thousands of internal Facebook documents leaked to media outlets continue to produce damning revelations about how the social media giant has prioritized its profits over user safety. The Facebook Papers have provided fresh evidence of how the company has let serious problems fester on its platform, including hate, misinformation, and human trafficking, and failed to invest in moderation outside English-speaking countries. The former Facebook product manager who shared the documents, Frances Haugen, is pressing lawmakers to more tightly regulate the company’s activities and testified Monday before the British Parliament ahead of scheduled meetings with officials in France, Germany and the European Union. Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg says the leaked documents paint a “false picture” based on cherry-picked evidence, but we speak with UCLA information studies professor Ramesh Srinivasan, who says they confirm what many critics have warned about for years. “This new form of digital capitalism that I believe Facebook is trailblazing is one that is playing with our intimate emotions on every single level.”
I've noted for a few times that the very obvious dysfunction in "big tech" has proven to be the gift that keeps on giving for "big telecom." While tech giants like Google, Amazon, and Facebook get the entirety of (often very justified) attention for dodgy business practices and terrible judgement, telecom has basically been forgotten in the DC Policy conversation. While lawsuits and Congressional posturing all focus on expanding oversight of "big tech," "big telecom" and "big media" have been able to lobotomize most of the oversight of its own businesses, despite engaging in all the same (and sometimes worse) dubious business practices.
Antitrust has not had its moment since the 1911 breakup of Standard Oil. But this past year, policymakers and government leaders around the globe have been taking a hard look at the technology markets. ‘Break up Big Tech’ is the newest antitrust catchphrase. On both sides of the Atlantic, policies have been introduced to foster digital competition.
Congress has introduced several competition and anti-trust bills, including a bipartisan package that passed out of committee. The Biden administration has nominated antitrust advocates to key positions: Lina Khan as chair of the Federal Trade Commission, Jonathan Kanter as the Assistant Attorney General for Antitrust at the Department of Justice, and Tim Wu at the National Economic Council. And across the Atlantic, the European Commission is marking up two key pieces of legislation, the Digital Markets Act and the Digital Services Act, that would create new rules for digital services and enhanced competition in the technology sector.€ €
Early this summer and on his first international travel trip, President Biden headed to Brussels to talk about creating a new U.S.- EU Tech and Trade Council (TTC) and a Joint Technology Competition Policy Dialogue (JTCPD). There have been few details aside from the initial press releases on what policy approaches would be considered. However, it is a clear sign that there is a transatlantic appetite for tackling competition in the technology space. But what would an international competition policy look like?
Every company that spends money and resources on research, development and marketing for its products needs assurance that competitors (or other third parties) cannot take advantage of its innovation. Profiting from innovation requires a good business model and an IP strategy is an important part of that business model.
Unlike trademarks, patents and copyright – which are well known and commonly used – design protection is sometimes forgotten or underestimated. However, the design of products, packaging, logos, drawings and artwork plays a key role in distinguishing new products from those of competitors.
Tesla Inc. escalated its trade secrets fight with Rivian Automotive Inc., accusing the maker of electric pickups of continuing to poach its employees and stealing “highly proprietary” battery technology.
Two whistleblowers have revealed that Facebook is well aware of the real world harms it causes to its users and to democratic ideals worldwide, but it chooses to prioritise profit over doing the right thing. We wrote to the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Information Technology asking them to initiate an inquiry into the revelations made, specifically about India and to call the relevant stakeholders to testify before it.
In a hotly awaited decision, the English Court of Appeal has ruled that AI-based machines cannot be named as inventors, upholding the original decision of the High Court and Comptroller general.
Dr Stephen Thaler has become well known in the intellectual property field ever since filing patent applications for two inventions: one entitled "Food Container" (GB18116909.4) and the other entitled "Devices and Methods of Attracting Enhanced Attention" (GB181816.0). However, despite its title, it is not the subject matter of the invention that has been attracting attention, but the named inventor: 'DABUS', an AI machine owned by Dr Thaler.
Sources say Senator Chris Coons could reintroduce an amended STRONGER as soon as this week, possibly as a counter to the Restoring the America Invents Act
Samsung Electronics Co. convinced two Federal Circuit judges that a confidentiality agreement concerning licensing negotiations doesn’t bar it from filing patent office challenges.
The board found all the challenged patent claims were invalid because they were anticipated or obvious.
The case involves the plight of Bruce R. Taylor, a Vietnam era Army veteran seeking compensation for disabilities resulting from his service. Before serving two tours overseas, Mr. Taylor volunteered to serve his country in a unique fashion—as a test subject. In 1969, the Army sought soldiers on which it would test toxic chemicals such as nerve gas. The Army’s purpose was to learn how its soldiers would function when exposed to agents that combatants might experience in service. Soldiers were given doses of an array of toxic substances and subjected to training exercises to measure performance. As a result of Mr. Taylor’s participation, he suffers from disabilities that the VA found eliminate his ability to work. In accordance with statute, the VA awarded Mr. Taylor monthly compensation.
Europe may soon have its Unified Patent Court and Williams Powell is ready to assist you. With attorneys qualified for the European Patent Litigation Certificate (which gives UPC rights of representation) and as a Patent Attorney Advocate & Litigator (which gives rights of representation in the UK Courts) we are well-placed not only to obtain IP protection but to conduct IP litigation, both in Europe and in the UK.
The White House officially announced its intention to nominate the Winston & Strawn partner to the position today, confirming rumours
President Biden has nominated leading patent litigator Kathi Vidal as the next USPTO director. Vidal is currently at Winston & Strawn, leading the company’s Silicon Valley office. She was previously with Fish & Richardson. [Announcement]
Vidal has all the qualifications. Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in electrical engineering (starting college at age 16); JD from Penn (EIC of the law review); Federal Circuit clerkship (Judge Schall); registered patent attorney; and litigated patent cases in courts across the country, including the PTAB. She represented Chamberlain whose garage door opener patents were obliterated by the eligibility revolution of Bilski–Mayo-and-Alice. At the same time, Vidal has represented many accused infringers.
On 8 October 2021, His Honour Judge Hacon (sitting as a Judge of the High Court) handed down his decision in an action brought by Royalty Pharma Collection Trust (“Royalty Pharma”) for approximately €23 million in royalty payments from Boehringer Ingelheim GmbH (“Boehringer”) (Royalty Pharma Collection Trust v Boehringer Ingelheim GmbH [2021] EWHC 2692 (Pat)). The action relates to products sold by Boehringer containing the active pharmaceutical ingredient (“API”) linagliptin for the treatment of type 2 diabetes. Boehringer manufactures the API in Germany. Some API is also formulated, labelled and packed into products in Germany, but some is exported by Boehringer to other countries.
Boehringer entered into a non-exclusive licence with Prosidion Limited in 2005. The agreement had a somewhat unusual governing law and jurisdiction clause in that it was governed by German law but provided that the Courts of England and Wales have jurisdiction over any dispute. The agreement was assigned from Prosidion to Royalty Pharma in 2011 and was amended in 2015 (but not with respect to the jurisdiction or governing law clauses). Royalty Pharma claimed outstanding royalties pursuant to the amended agreement. One of the patents licensed by Royalty Pharma to Boehringer was the German designation of EP 1 084 705 (“EP 705”), and it is this patent which formed the subject of the dispute.
Ericsson means business, and it's not going to undervalue its patents in the renewal of its license agreement with Apple. Earlier this month, Ericsson filed a declaratory judgment action--on its own FRAND compliance--in the Eastern District of Texas. I've now become aware of a decision the Rechtbank Den Haag (Court of The Hague) published (in Dutch) last week. Judge D. Nobel denied an Ericsson petition for an anti-antisuit injunction against Apple. It may be counterintuitive, but all things considered the decision is clearly better for Ericsson--though it's "the loser" at first sight--than for Apple. As matter of fact, Apple itself has a history of bringing cases that serve a strategic purpose even if a court rejects a motion or complaint (such as when it demonstrated to the rest of the industry that it would enforce its design rights around the globe, even though it ultimately failed everywhere but in its home court).
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Claim 1 of EP 705 is in the EPC 2000 form and covers a class of effectors of particular enzymatic activity for use in lowering the blood glucose level of mammals for the alleviation of diabetes.
The German courts have ruled that EPC 2000 claims correspond to purpose-limited product claims and can be directly infringed via an act in s.9(1) German Patents Act 1980. Case law further indicates that the subject-matter of such claims lies in the suitability of the substance “for” a certain medical use. In order to determine whether an infringer’s product is “for” the treatment of the indication specified in the claim, the German courts have developed the doctrine of sinnfällige Herrichtung. If the product of the claim is sufficiently tied to (or “earmarked for”) the use specified in the claim, the requirement of sinnfällige Herrichtung is satisfied.
[...]
It is interesting to consider whether the same decision would be reached if Hacon HHJ had had to apply English law rather than German law.
Stakeholders could try to use Judge Pauline Newman’s dissent in Mobility Workx to extend USPTO director review to PTAB institution decisions, say sources
The Motion Picture Association would like the US Government's executive cybersecurity order to be optimized to identify operators of pirate sites and services. Among other things, the order should require U.S.-based IaaS providers, including hosting services, DNS servers, reverse proxies, and cryptocurrency exchanges, to robustly verify the identities of foreign customers.
Former UFC star and Dancing With The Stars runner-up Paige VanZant is reportedly making more money from selling pictures and videos of herself online than she ever did with the MMA organization. Unsurprisingly, some fans refuse to pay for her content so in response, VanZant has now gone to court in the US to force Discord to hand over their personal details.
