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Links 17/05/2023: New Tails and Debian Installer Bookworm RC 3



  • GNU/Linux

    • Applications

      • TecMintRemmina – A Feature Rich Remote Desktop Sharing Tool for Linux

        Remmina is a free and open-source, feature-rich, and powerful remote desktop client for Linux and other Unix-like systems, written in GTK+3. It’s intended for system administrators and travelers, who need to remotely access and work with many computers.

        It supports several network protocols in a simple, unified, homogeneous, and easy-to-use user interface.

    • Instructionals/Technical

      • Linux CapableHow to Install MusicBrainz Picard on Ubuntu 22.04 | 20.04

        Picture this: your music library is a sprawling, unorganized mess of songs, albums, and artists -- it's practically impossible to navigate. Finding that one special track is like seeking a needle in a haystack.

      • Adam Young: Acronym Challenge Programmatic Interface

        How do you know what is inside your computer? There are a couple tools. If the hardware is on the PCI bus, from the command line you can run lspci, which will in turn enumerate the discovered devices on that bus. But what if the hardware is not on the PCI bus? And how does the Kernel discover it in the first place? For the hardware that I have to work with, the answer is that it is enumerated by the Unified Extensible Firmware Interface (UEFI) coded embedded in the device and exposed via the Advanced Configuration and Power Interface (ACPI). This world is full of four letter acronyms. Here are my notes on some of them.

      • Linux CapableHow to Install CUDA on Ubuntu 22.04 | 20.04

        In the realm of high-performance computing, CUDA (Compute Unified Device Architecture) stands as a revolutionary technology. Developed by Nvidia, CUDA is a parallel computing platform and application programming interface (API) model that leverages the power of Nvidia GPUs (Graphics Processing Units) to boost the computational speed and efficiency of software applications.

      • [Repeat] APNICRFC 9234 observed in the wild

        Route leaks occur when Border Gateway Protocol (BGP) prefixes are propagated in a way that goes against the expected topology relationships of BGP. For example, this can happen when a route learned from one transit provider is announced to another transit provider or a lateral peer (peer-peer-peer), or when a route learned from one lateral peer is announced to another lateral peer or a transit provider (see RFC 7908). These leaks often result from misconfiguration or the absence of BGP route filtering, or from inadequate coordination between Autonomous Systems (ASes).

      • OSTechNixHow To Clean Up Junk Files In Ubuntu Using Ubuntu Cleaner

        Ubuntu Cleaner is a tool that helps you to clean up your Ubuntu or derivative system by removing old kernels, package configurations, and other unnecessary files to free up space.

      • OSTechNixHow To Restore Vanilla GNOME Desktop With Flatpak Support In Ubuntu

        As you may already know, starting from the Ubuntu 18.04 version, the default desktop environment is GNOME. Prior to that, Ubuntu used a custom desktop environment called Unity. GNOME is one of the most popular desktop environments which is known for its simplicity, accessibility, and ease of use. While Ubuntu uses the GNOME DE by default, it's important to note that Ubuntu's version of GNOME is heavily customized. Some of you may not like the customized version of GNOME in Ubuntu. If you're one of them, this tutorial will help you to restore Vanilla GNOME desktop with flatpaks support in Ubuntu, much like what you'd find in a fresh Fedora installation.

      • Terence EdenThe limits of CSS styling select options

        As you can see, it's possible to do some pretty extravagant styling of the individual <options> you can even change how they look when they're selected.

      • OSTechNixHow To Optimize Laptop Battery Life With TLP In Linux

        There are quite a few tools exists to power saving and battery life extension in Laptops. We already have looked at two tools namely Laptop Mode Tools and Powertop that improves the Linux Laptop battery performance. Today we will discuss yet another Laptop power management utility named TLP. TLP is a feature-rich commandline tool to optimize Laptop battery life in Linux.

      • Linux CapableHow to Install Zim Wiki on Ubuntu 22.04 | 20.04

        Zim Wiki is an innovative piece of software designed to cater to your need for a well-organized digital notebook. It's a desktop application that combines a notepad's simplicity with the power of a Wiki, offering a unique blend of convenience and functionality.

      • MedevelHow to Scrap Webpages using Using Node.js and Cheerio

        Web scraping is a process of extracting useful information from web pages. Node.js is a popular backend language that can be used for web scraping. In this tutorial, we will learn how to use Node.js for web scraping.

        Prerequisites

        Before we start, make sure you have the following

      • UNIX CopHow to enable HSTS in Nginx

        Hello, friends. In this post, you will learn how to enable HSTS in Nginx. This is simple and useful in configurations made to increase security. Introduction – What is HSTP? HSTS is short for HTTP Strict Transport Security, which in its best translation means HTTP Strict Transport Security.

      • Linux CapableHow to Enable or Disable AppArmor on Linux Mint 21/20

        AppArmor, short for Application Armor, is a Linux Security Module (LSM) that provides a set of tools to protect your system at the application level.

      • ID RootHow To Install PuTTY on Rocky Linux 9

        In this tutorial, we will show you how to install PuTTY on Rocky Linux 9. Are you a system administrator, network engineer, or software developer in search of a reliable and versatile tool for connecting to remote systems and managing them securely?

      • Storage Unleashed: Achieving Seamlessness in Kubernetes and Enterprise Storage Integration

        Introduction Enterprise storage has become an essential component of many modern businesses.

      • Volume Projection: Advanced Techniques in Kubernetes

        Introduction Kubernetes is a container orchestration platform that allows developers to effortlessly manage and scale their applications. One of the most crucial elements of Kubernetes is storage management. Kubernetes provides developers with a flexible and scalable way to store data using its volume abstraction layer.

      • Linux HintExamples of Creating an Index in PostgreSQL

        Guide on the different examples of creating a single or multi-column indexes in PostgreSQL to eliminate the duplicates and concurrent indexes to avoid locking.

      • Linux HintPostgreSQL BPCHAR Data Type

        Practical guide on understanding how CHAR(n) and VARCHAR(n) work to understand how BPCHAR works and how it affects the characters when working with PostgreSQL.

      • Linux HintHow to Find the Array Length in Bash

        Tutorial on the methods of counting the length of an array in Bash using the “#” symbol or loop, or using the “wc” or “grep” commands along with examples.

      • Linux HintHow Does Docker Registry Differ from Docker Repository?

        Docker Registry is the storage system for Docker images, while Docker Repository is a way to organize and manage images within a particular registry.

      • Trend OceansHow to Install and Use dig and nslookup Commands in Linux for DNS Lookup

        Well, if you have any problems with DNS resolution or want to check the DNS information, you can always look for that information with the dig and nslookup commands in Linux.

      • Linux CapableHow to Install Firefox Beta, Nightly on Ubuntu 22.04 | 20.04

        Welcome to the world of Mozilla Firefox, where the future of internet browsing is continuously being shaped and refined. Within this vibrant ecosystem, you'll discover two unique, feature-packed browsers: Firefox Beta and Firefox Nightly.

      • Linux CapableHow to Install gThumb on Ubuntu 22.04 | 20.04

        Meet gThumb, an advanced image viewer and browser tailor-made for the GNOME desktop environment. This open-source application is a favorite amongst many Ubuntu users due to its impressive array of features and simplistic design.

      • TecMintHow to Fix “sudo unable to open read-only file system” Error

        The Linux filesystem is a built-in layer that manages how files are stored and retrieved on a Linux system and other storage devices. It provides a directory structure that defines the location of files on the system, and without it, your system would be a complete mess.

        The health of a filesystem is therefore crucial for the integrity of data. For this reason, the error “sudo unable to open read-only file system” can be particularly disturbing and ominous.

    • Games

  • Distributions and Operating Systems

    • TecMintA Detailed Comparison Between Deepin vs Elementary OS

      Linux comes in numerous distributions or flavors, each suited for a particular purpose. Distributions such as RHEL (Red Hat Enterprise Linux), SUSE Enterprise Linux, Debian, Rocky, and AlmaLinux are recommended for server and data center environments.

      Others such as Ubuntu, Linux Mint, MX Linux, Manjaro, and Zorin are some of the best desktop distributions you can install on your laptop or PC.

    • Fedora Family / IBM

      • Red Hat OfficialConfidential computing use cases [Ed: IBM/Red Hat pushing data breach (outsourcing) as privacy or "confidential computing"]

        This article is the third in a six-part series (see our previous blog), where we present various usage models for confidential computing, a set of technologies designed to protect data in use—for example using memory encryption—and the requirements to get the expected security and trust benefits from t​​he technology.

        In this third article, we consider the four most important use cases for confidential computing: confidential virtual machines, confidential workloads, confidential containers and confidential clusters. This will allow us to better understand the trade-offs between the various approaches, and how this impacts the implementation of attestation.

    • Debian Family

      • TorNew Release: Tails 5.13

        We will provide a migration plan from LUKS1 to LUKS2 for existing Persistent Storage in Tails 5.14 (early June).

      • DebianDebian Installer Bookworm RC 3 release
        The Debian Installer team[1] is pleased to announce the third release
        candidate of the installer for Debian 12 "Bookworm".
        
        

        Improvements in this release ============================

        * finish-install: - Adjust APT cache cleaning to avoid breaking bash completion (#1034650). * grub-installer: - Detect EFI boot variables with hexadecimal digits, not only decimal digits. * hw-detect: - Restore support for firmware license prompts (#1033921). * linux: - Build against updated dwarves, reducing its size and memory footprint (#1033301). * partman-base: - Add support for input submitted using power-of-two units: kiB, MiB, GiB, etc. (#913431). Note that sizes are still output using power-of-ten units: kB, MB, GB, etc. - Add support for bigger prefixes: petabyte (PB), pebibyte (PiB), exabyte (EB), and exbibyte (EiB). - With many thanks to Vincent Danjean! * preseed: - Make sure netcfg considers DHCP-provided hostnames, only using the hostname parameter on the kernel command line as a fallback (#1035349).

        Hardware support changes ========================

        * debian-installer: - Ship dedicated DRM modules for bochs and cirrus to avoid broken graphics under UEFI/Secure Boot (#1036019). * linux: - Work around black screen on ppc64el (#1033058). * xorg-server: - Ship modesetting_drv.so in the udeb again, fixing graphical installer support on UTM (#1035014).

        Localization status ===================

        * 78 languages are supported in this release. * Full translation for 41 of them.

        Known bugs in this release ==========================

        * There seems to be no known major bug as of yet.

        See the errata[2] for details and a full list of known issues.

        Feedback for this release =========================

        We need your help to find bugs and further improve the installer, so please try it. Installation images, and everything else you will need are available at our web site[3].

    • Canonical/Ubuntu Family

      • UbuntuA brief history of MicroStack

        OpenStack is no doubt a wonderful and successful piece of software. It allows you to create your own cloud infrastructure, and thanks to its open-source nature, it’s free to use for everyone. But as with many giant software projects, all that power comes with a challenge: it is reasonably complex to install and configure. A number of OpenStack distributions do exist that intend to make engineers’ life a lot easier, but those also tend to be more complex than a non-experienced user would like them to be.

        To solve this problem once and for all, Canonical created a simplified and easy-to-install distribution of OpenStack called MicroStack.

    • Open Hardware/Modding

      • Raspberry PiBugg.xyz acoustic monitoring for conservationists

        Bugg wildlife traps record the sounds of the forest, and are AI-trained to listen to the quietest creatures, as well as those that broadcast their whereabouts to all and sundry. In fact, it’s more of an acoustic census, creating detailed records of the particular soundscapes of contrasting habitats, noting changes that may indicate deforestation or a natural disaster leading to depleted biodiversity. Dr Sarab Sethi, an environment research scientist at Imperial College London, developed the Bugg acoustic monitoring system, which is now being used to record the sounds of forests from Norway to Taiwan, as well as Bali and Borneo.

      • HackadayMIDI Interface For NeXTcube Plugs Into The Past

        [Joren] recently did some work as part of an electronic music heritage project, and restored an 80s-era NeXTcube workstation complete with vintage sound card, setting it up with a copy of MAX, a graphical music programming environment. But there was one piece missing: MIDI. [Joren] didn’t let that stop him, and successfully created hardware to allow MIDI input and output.

      • The Drone GirlDJI Agras T20P finally available outside Asia

        The announcement coincides with Brazil’s Agrishow which occured last week and is one of the largest agricultural technology trade shows in the world.

      • PurismIs Advanced AI a Reason to Decouple from The Centralized Internet?
      • Raspberry PiIs this the world’s first Raspberry Pi Pico birthday card?

        We know Kevin McAleer best for his robots, but a big birthday in his family inspired him to pivot to greetings cards. He has created what we’re loosely billing as the world’s first Raspberry Pi Pico-powered birthday card. This interactive build guides the recipient to press buttons and play their personalised greeting.

    • Mobile Systems/Mobile Applications

  • Free, Libre, and Open Source Software

    • Web Browsers/Web Servers

      • Mozilla

        • MozillaThe Mozilla Blog: Pocket’s new features make it even easier to discover and organize content [Ed: Mozilla hired managers from Facebook and Twitter. Now it's turning Firefox into social control media instead of a browser.]

          Stay Up to Date and Informed On the Topics You Care About€ 

          Pocket’s latest updates make it simpler than ever to discover and organize high-quality content that aligns with your unique interests and passions. As you may have noticed, Pocket has been rapidly evolving and growing; we’re listening to our users so that we can continue to make Pocket the go-to destination to stay informed and keep up to date with the topics you love. Starting today, Pocket is rolling out a new mobile and web experience so you can easily find the stories and topics you care about. In addition, Pocket is launching a new feature called Lists (at launch just on web, with the feature coming to Pocket mobile later this year), which will make it simpler to organize saved content.€ 

    • SaaS/Back End/Databases

      • Peter EisentrautOverview of ICU collation settings

        ICU use is becoming more prominent in PostgreSQL. One of the benefits that ICU offers is a lot of customization options for collations. Some of these are given as examples in the PostgreSQL documentation, but I have always found it hard to get complete and easily-accessible information about this.

        So for this article, I dug deeper and looked up all the collation settings that there are and tried to work out examples for each one.

    • Education

      • OlimexTuxCon the open source hardware and software conference in Plovdiv is June 10 and 11!

        On June 10, at the Technical University in Plovdiv, there will be a series of 9 talks starting at 11 o’clock. Following the talks, there will be a quiz with prizes and lightning talks, during which visitors can share something interesting they have discovered or are working on in the field of Open Source. The first day will conclude with the FOSS beer event at Fabric bar.

        On June 11, the traditional soldering workshop will take place at the Olimex Training Building. Participants can choose between soldering kits or creating art using broken electronic components.

    • Programming/Development

      • ErlangErlang/OTP 26 Highlights

        A list of all changes is found in Erlang/OTP 26 Readme. Or, as always, look at the release notes of the application you are interested in. For instance: Erlang/OTP 26 - Erts Release Notes - Version 14.0.

      • Python

        • AdafruitCircuitPython 8.1.0 Release Candidate 0 Released! @circuitpython

          This is CircuitPython 8.1.0-rc.0, a release candidate for 8.1.0. We believe it is stable, and are making a release candidate for further testing before final release.

        • HackadaySelf-Driving Library For Python

          Fully autonomous vehicles seem to perennially be just a few years away, sort of like the automotive equivalent of fusion power. But just because robotic vehicles haven’t made much progress on our roadways doesn’t mean we can’t play with the technology at the hobbyist level. You can embark on your own experimentation right now with this open source self-driving Python library.

  • Leftovers

    • Troy PattersonWeb Site Prophecy

      So, I ended up taking troypatterson.me. Little did I know that in a way, that would turn out to be prophetic. See, now I live in Maine, where the state abbreviation is ME. So, I guess I now have Troy Patterson of Maine as my website address.

    • The NationThe Last Cosmopolitan

      Elias Canetti belonged to Europe’s 20th century. It was a period of extreme horrors that gave way to a slow but determined effort to heal. The scale of the suffering that he and millions of others witnessed in the first half of the century led to the pledge—“Never again!”—that was supposed to define its second half. But history has a way of relapsing. While no conflict since then has matched the violence of World War II, and no catastrophe has found its equal in the more than 50 million people who died—including in extermination camps—Europe in the 21st century has seen a reawakening of the far-right nationalist and racist ideologies that engulfed the continent during that horrible era. Authoritarian governments, nationalism, racism, anti-Semitism, anti-immigrant sentiments, the scapegoating of minorities, and the fight over territory have all gained a new intensity over the past decade.1

    • The NationSurprise!

      The critics agree: Beau Is Afraid is a Freudian farce, a nightmarish horror-comedy, a tragicomic Oedipal odyssey. But what does all this mean—that it’s about mommy issues? That it’s funny and scary? That the protagonist takes a long journey; that the film itself is long? Ari Aster’s latest begins in a birth canal and ends with a passage through a murky birthlike tunnel. We cut from newborn Beau’s perspective of the birthing room to his spot on a therapist’s couch. This is a movie in which everything is expelled and nothing is left out.1

    • The NationProper Fat
    • ButtondownMostly announcements and plans but also some fun floating point trivia

      This is a really busy week for me, so light newsletter this time. Let’s start with obligatory stuff and then get into fun newsletter stuff.

    • HackadayTwo Stage Refrigerator Is Chill

      Every time we check in with [Hyperspace Pirate] he’s trying to make things cold. Really cold. His recent two-part video shows a propane vapor compression system that can go down to -37€° C as well as a two-stage system using homemade ethylene that can get to -83€° C. He’s trying to get to -100€°, so he’s close, and we have no doubt he’ll get there.

    • HackadayHackaday Prize 2023: Learn DSP With The Portable All-in-One Workstation

      Learning Digital Signal Processing (DSP) techniques traditionally involves working through a good bit of mathematics and signal theory. To promote a hands-on approach, [Clyne] developed the DSP PAW (Portable All-in-one Workstation). DSP PAW hardware and software provide a complete learning environment for any computer where DSP algorithms can be entered as C++ code through an Arduino-like IDE.

    • HackadayA Bicycle Powered By A Different Kind Of Eddy

      When you think of a bicycle and an Eddy, you’d be forgiven for thinking first of Eddy Merckx, one of the most successful competitive cyclists to ever live. But this bicycle, modified by [Tom Stanton] as shown in the video below the break, has been modified by ditching its direct drive gearing in favor of using the friction-like eddy currents between magnets and copper to transfer power to the wheel.

    • Science

      • HackadayHuman DNA Is Everywhere: A Boon For Science, While Terrifying Others

        Environmental DNA sampling is nothing new. Rather than having to spot or catch an animal, instead the DNA from the traces they leave can be sampled, giving clues about their genetic diversity, their lineage (e.g. via mitochondrial DNA) and the population’s health. What caught University of Florida (UoF) researchers by surprise while they were using environmental DNA sampling to study endangered sea turtles, was just how much human DNA they found in their samples. This led them to perform a study on the human DNA they sampled in this way, with intriguing implications.

      • MeduzaOpen letter reveals fourth Novosibirsk scientist hit with treason charges in last year — Meduza

        Valery Zvegintsev, a chief scientist at the Institute of Theoretical and Applied Mechanics at the Russian Academy of Sciences’s Siberian branch, was arrested for treason earlier this year, according to an open letter in support of multiple Novosibirsk scientists accused of treason that was released on Monday.

    • Education

      • Phil EatonTwo books I recommend to developers

        These are the books I recommend to developers wanting to improve their skills as professional programmers because of high information density, believable premises/examples, and being well edited.

        You don't need to read books to improve as a developer but they are unparalleled in quickly helping you gain depth in a subject.

      • ChrisReading Slightly More Incrementally

        Some people have asked how I can learn so much from what I read. I don’t believe I do – in fact, I believe I squander most of what learning potential does exist. I’m trying to change that, and this is how. Starting back up with spaced repetition has afforded me to also read non-fiction books differently.

    • Hardware

      • Tom's HardwareLoongson Begins to Enable CPUs That Could Rival AMD and Intel Offerings
        Loongson has started posting its first Linux patches for the upcoming 3A6000-series processors, which promise to rival AMD's Zen 3-based CPUs.

        [...]

        Loongson shared details about the progress of its 3A6000-series CPU development last November when it revealed that the design phase of the project had been concluded and that samples of the processors would be available in the first half of 2023.

      • Tom's HardwareAsus Responds to AM5 BIOS Controversy: Warranty Covers Beta Fixes, EXPO Presets

        In a statement that went out via email and press release, Asus affirms that, despite repeated claims elsewhere last week, its AM5 motherboard warranty covers not only recent BIOS updates to Ryzen 7000 boards designed to fix voltage issues that led to chip and/or board failures for some users, but also all AMD EXPO, Intel XMP, and (Asus' proprietary) DOCP memory presets. It also stated that all recent BIOS updates follow AMD's voltage guidelines for Ryzen 7000 CPUs.

      • Tom's HardwareLoongson Begins to Enable CPUs That Could Rival AMD and Intel Offerings
      • Stacey on IoTBell Labs wants to turn existing fiber into a networked sensor

        Mikael Mazur, a member of the technical staff at Bell Labs, said he is looking to turn the existing fiber optic cables along the sea floor, in buildings, and strung along telephone poles as a sensor to detect temperature changes, weather, earthquakes — even structural changes in buildings.

      • Tom's HardwareRussian CPUs Double the Price Due to Deficit and Logistics: Report

        Prices on Russian CPUs are increasing, due to the deficit and logistics issues. Also surprising is that some foundries may still be producing CPUs for Russian companies, if a report is to be believed.

    • Health/Nutrition/Agriculture

      • New York TimesHow to Think About the New Breast Cancer Screening Guidelines

        A breast cancer surgeon’s take on the new mammogram advice.

      • Pro PublicaCongress Questions Cigna’s Large-Scale Denial of Insurance Claims

        A key congressional committee asked insurance giant Cigna on Tuesday to provide corporate documents so that lawmakers can examine the company’s practice of denying health care claims without ever opening a patient file.

        The House Committee on Energy and Commerce joined several state and federal regulators in scrutinizing the legality of Cigna rejecting the payment of certain claims using a system known as PXDX.

      • Pro PublicaMinnesota Board of Nursing Weighs Terminating Executive Director

        The Minnesota Board of Nursing has called an emergency meeting to consider removing its beleaguered executive director over an unspecified “personnel issue.”

        In an email to board staff Tuesday morning, President Laura Elseth said Executive Director Kimberly Miller was on leave “effective today.”

      • The NationIn East Palestine, Norfolk Southern Hired a Company With a Long History of Ignoring Hazards

        Before February 3, East Palestine, Ohio, was the kind of place that balanced bucolic idyll with the convenience of urban living. The town, home to fewer than 5,000 people, is both far enough from Pittsburgh and close enough to it for residents to be able say, “We’re a bit in the city, but we’re a bit in the country.” That was before a portion of a 150-car freight train slipped off a track and burst into flames.1Additional reporting and research by Andrea Navarro and Jesse Newman.

      • The NationTime Is Running Out for Texas Republicans to Clarify Exceptions in Their New Abortion Law

        Amanda Zurawski and her husband were “beyond thrilled” to soon welcome their first child, a daughter named Willow, last fall following more than a year of “grueling” fertility treatments. However, things took a tragic turn for the Texas couple. During her second trimester, Zurawski began experiencing odd symptoms and, after a medical exam, learned that she had dilated prematurely because of a condition known as cervical insufficiency. Shortly after the diagnosis, her water broke at just 17 weeks, leading doctors to inform the aspiring mother that the loss of her daughter was inevitable.

      • The NationPay No Attention to the GOP “Debate” on Abortion

        Last month, I fell for a kayfabe. The far-right Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America (SBA) “broke” with disgraced former president Donald Trump over his opposition to a national abortion ban and his preference to return the issue to the states. The group called it a “morally indefensible position for a self-proclaimed pro-life presidential candidate” and pledged not to support any candidate “who refuses to embrace at a minimum a 15-week national standard.”

      • HackadayMicrobubbles And Ultrasound: Getting Drugs Through The Blood-Brain Barrier

        The brain is a rather important organ, and as such, nature has gone to great lengths to protect it. The skull provides physical protection against knocks and bumps, but there’s a lesser-known defense mechanism at work too: the blood-brain barrier. It’s responsible for keeping all the nasty stuff – like bacteria, viruses, and weird chemicals – from messing up your head.

    • Proprietary

      • TechdirtWikipedia Grapples With Chatbots: Should It Allow Their Use For Articles? Should It Allow Them To Train On Wikipedia?

        We know Kevin McAleer best for his robots, but a big birthday in his family inspired him to pivot to greetings cards. He has created what we’re loosely billing as the world’s first Raspberry Pi Pico-powered birthday card. This interactive build guides the recipient to press buttons and play their personalised greeting.

      • Wladimir PalantMalicious code in PDF Toolbox extension

        The PDF Toolbox extension for Google Chrome has more than 2 million users and an average rating of 4,2 in the Chrome Web Store. So I was rather surprised to discover obfuscated code in it that has apparently gone unnoticed for at least a year.

        The code has been made to look like a legitimate extension API wrapper, merely with some convoluted logic on top. It takes a closer look to recognize unexpected functionality here, and quite some more effort to understand what it is doing.

        This code allows serasearchtop[.]com website to inject arbitrary JavaScript code into all websites you visit. While it is impossible for me to tell what this is being used for, the most likely use is injecting ads. More nefarious uses are also possible however.

      • MeduzaVulnerability in Telegram for macOS lets malware access user mic and camera — Meduza

        Telegram messenger has confirmed that a vulnerability has been detected in its macOS app available via the App Store. The desktop app that can be downloaded from the company’s website doesn’t have this problem, Telegram clarified in a tweet.

      • Windows TCO

        • The Register UKRansomware-as-a-service groups rain money on their affiliates

          Researchers with cybersecurity firm Group-IB infiltrated the Qilin gang in March and this week analyzed its operations in a report that detailed its inner workings and the economic model that keeps it churning.

        • Hearst CommunicationsNew York audit: School districts unprepared for cyber attacks

          The Education Department “has not taken the fundamental steps or improved the technical controls needed to secure its own critical systems,” the auditors said.

          Auditors also went to four school districts and scanned their systems for vulnerabilities. What they found was so concerning that the districts took immediate action, they said.

        • Scoop News GroupRussian man charged over ransomware attacks, including against D.C. police

          The 30-year-old Mikhail Matveev, who is based in Kaliningrad, Russia, is also charged with ransomware incidents affecting law enforcement in New Jersey, as well as several victims in the health care sector, according to newly unsealed indictments from the Justice Department. Along with the criminal charges, the Treasury announced sanctions barring Matveev from conducting financial transactions in the United States, and the State Department issued a $10 million reward for his arrest.

          The investigation into Matveev involved the FBI, IRS and local law enforcement in D.C. and New Jersey, as well as authorities from Japan, the U.K., France, Germany and the European Union.

        • Scoop News GroupRansomware group claims 2.5 terabytes of stolen data less than a month after emerging online

          A new cybercrime outfit calling itself RA GROUP is just the latest to take advantage of leaked Babuk ransomware source code.

          The post Ransomware group claims 2.5 terabytes of stolen data less than a month after emerging online appeared first on CyberScoop.

        • Silicon Angle5.8M records stolen in ransomware attack on pharmacy company PharMerica
          Fortune 1000 company and pharmacy services provider PharMerica Corp. has been struck by a ransomware attack, with data from 5.8 million patients stolen and published online. The theft of data was first disclosed in a€ breach notice filed with the Office of the Maine Attorney General.

        • Krebs On SecurityRussian Hacker “Wazawaka” Indicted for Ransomware

          A Russian man identified by KrebsOnSecurity in January 2022 as a prolific and vocal member of several top ransomware groups was the subject of two indictments unsealed by the Justice Department today. U.S. prosecutors say Mikhail Pavolovich Matveev, a.k.a. “Wazawaka” and “Boriselcin” worked with three different ransomware gangs that extorted hundreds of millions of dollars from companies, schools, hospitals and government agencies.

    • Linux Foundation

    • Security

      • Silicon AngleDiscord suffers data breach after third-party agent was compromised
        The popular messaging platform service Discord Inc. has suffered a data breach after a third-party agent was compromised. In a message to affected users first shared May 11€ on Reddit,

      • Krebs On SecurityRe-Victimization from Police-Auctioned Cell Phones

        Countless smartphones seized in arrests and searches by police forces across the United States are being auctioned online without first having the data on them erased, a practice that can lead to crime victims being re-victimized, a new study found. In response, the largest online marketplace for items seized in U.S. law enforcement investigations says it now ensures that all phones sold through its platform will be data-wiped prior to auction.

      • Privacy/Surveillance

        • US News And World ReportBill Would Require Manufacturers to Enable Porn Filters on Phones, Tablets

          Alabama lawmakers advanced anti-pornography legislation Tuesday that would require phones and tablets to automatically block sexually explicit content or pornography until the purchaser changes the device settings.

          The House of Representatives voted 70-8 for the bill by Republican Rep. Chris Sells, of Greenville. The bill now moves to the state Senate.

        • ScheerpostNeighborhood Watch Out: Cops Are Incorporating Private Cameras Into Their Real-Time Surveillance Networks

          Police have their sights set on every surveillance camera in every business, on every porch, in all the cities and counties of the country. Grocery store trips, walks down the street, and otherwise minding your own business when outside your home could soon come under the ever-present eye of the government. In a quiet but rapid expansion of law enforcement surveillance, U.S. cities are buying and promoting products from Georgia-based company Fusus in order to access on-demand, live video from public and private camera networks.

        • Thompson Reuters FoundationPrivacy or safety? U.S. brings 'surveillance city to the suburbs'

          Fusus technology is being operated in over 60 different cities and counties across more than a dozen states, by police departments, school districts and sheriffs as part of public safety initiatives, according to public records requests and announcements seen by the Thomson Reuters Foundation.

    • Defence/Aggression

    • Transparency/Investigative Reporting

      • Michael West MediaPlaying chicken to the detriment of democracy and cost to the taxpayer

        Far too often, government departments and its agencies deny Freedom of Information requests without good reason. It leads to unnecessary delays, costs, and the withholding of information that the public deserves to know. What’s the scam?

        The scam is that in so many Freedom of Information (FOI) matters, the Government’s decisions have been very poorly thought out, or been deliberately contrived. The decisions are made by official who receive their pay cheque from the public. When I appeal their decisions, as I will do when they are bizarre, the Government often backflips at the 11th hour.

    • Environment

      • IdiomdrottningBrownshirts vs climate

        Pit-in-the-stomach feeling reading the news today as the brownshirts in Sweden are gearing up to delay climate solutions even harder, through outright denial. This is a horror show since the other parties are already bad and insufficient at climate stuff. We definitiviely can’t afford to add a big old stinking Overton magnet in the opposite direction.

    • Finance

      • Atlantic CouncilThe US debt ceiling stalemate threatens money market funds—and financial stability

        Money markets would be the first to react to a debt ceiling breach, heightening market turmoil at the wrong time and helping to raise the odds of a severe recession.

      • Latvia'How to recognize corruption' available in English

        Latvia's Corruption Combating and Prevention Bureau (KNAB) has published an English-language version of a corruption-spotting handbook it published in Latvian in 2022.

      • New York TimesGlimmers of Hope for a Debt Deal

        Also, a leader in A.I. asks for regulation. Here’s the latest at the end of Tuesday.

      • Common DreamsMeet the Federal Judge Who Could Decide Whether or Not the US Defaults

        As the possibility of a government default on the national debt which could tank the global economy looms, the National Association of Government Employees (NAGE) has sued the government in the U.S. District Court in Massachusetts claiming that the debt ceiling law is unconstitutional and unenforceable. According to its complaint, NAGE asks the court to “declare that the Debt Limit Statute is presently unconstitutional and of no force and further seeks to enjoin [President Biden and Treasury Secretary Yellen] from refusing to borrow to meet the operations of government approved by Congress and the debts and obligations that also must be paid pursuant to the Fourteenth Amendment…”

      • Michael West Media"Hi Babe" Case: ASIC witnesses mauled in court, Commbank embarrassed, evidence ends abruptly

        The credibility of witnesses was tested severely in ASIC’s case against bank victim advocate Geoff Shannon yesterday, and case evidence was brought to an abrupt close amid talk of perjury. Lisa-Jane Roberts reports from Southport.€ € 

        The cross-examination of ASIC’s star witness in the case against bank victims advocate Geoff Shannon concluded yesterday at Southport Court on the Gold Coast, and the trial was adjourned until 22 August 2023, when both parties will present their final submissions to the court.

      • Michael West MediaInnovation Evangelist: Stockland and Mirvac roped, bound by Bricklet property rorts

        As far as property scams go, it’s a slick one, although you might say it began with good intentions. Giuseppe Porcelli, the Maserati-driving tech entrepreneur from Manly on Sydney’s Northern Beaches, even managed to rope in the bluest of blue chip property types, enticing no less than Stockland and Mirvac into his Bricklet venture as cornerstone investors. Michael West reports.

        Bricklet is a new variant of the “property fractionalisation model”. Fractionalisation means selling bits of a property – rather than the whole property. It is designed to appeal to those who can’t afford their own house or apartment.

    • AstroTurf/Lobbying/Politics

      • The NationA Bernie Sanders Progressive Could Be the Next Leader of One of America’s Largest Counties

        Bernie Sanders started his career in elected office as the mayor of the largest city in Vermont. Though he eventually became a member of the US House, a US senator and, finally, a presidential contender whose 2016 and 2020 campaigns transformed debates about economic inequality in America, Sanders has always recognized that, while big policy decisions are made at the federal level and in the nation’s statehouses, the implementation of those policies takes place primarily at the local level. That’s one of the reasons Sanders has gone out of his way to make endorsements of progressives running in mayoral races and contests for county executive posts across the country.

      • The NationTurkish Election Aftershock: Despite Unity on the Left, the Opposition Falls Short

        Istanbul, Turkey—Sunday started sunny and cheerful in Turkey’s most populous city. Scores of families headed to secondary schools to cast their ballots and have their say in Turkish politics. That the country’s longtime president Recep Tayyip ErdoÄŸan would lose in this first round of presidential elections seemed a historical inevitability to the smiling, hopeful people lining the streets in my upper-middle-class neighborhood. In a few hours, we would be proven terribly wrong.

      • New York TimesTurkey’s Opposition Struggles to Chart Path as Runoff Nears

        President Recep Tayyip Erdogan looks likely to benefit most from the votes that went to an ultranationalist candidate eliminated in the first round.

      • New York Times4 Takeaways from Turkey’s Nail-Biting Presidential Election

        Recep Tayyip Erdogan is headed for his — and his country’s — first presidential runoff vote. But the first round showed the longtime leader’s continued strength.

      • Election calendar in the second round

        With none of the candidates receiving more than 50 percent of the votes, the second round of Turkey's presidential elections will be held on May 28.

      • TechdirtFederal Court Rejects FBI’s Attempt To Glomar Its Way Out Of A Trump-Related FOIA Lawsuit

        After Donald Trump was forced to vacate the Oval Office to make way for its newest tenant, he apparently decided to cement his legacy by walking off with boxes full of classified documents. When the National Archive and Records Administration began filing away the records Trump actually deigned to turn over to it, it found a bunch of classified information. This led to an investigation by the DOJ and, ultimately, a raid of Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence to recover any other classified documents the ex-president might have taken with him.

      • Democracy NowReport from U.S.-Mexico Border as Title 42 Ends: Human Rights Violations, Funerals & Makeshift Camps

        We host a roundtable discussion on the human rights crisis unfolding at the U.S.-Mexico border and the impact of President Biden ending the Trump-era pandemic policy known as Title 42 last Thursday, after it had been used to expel nearly 3 million migrants without due process. Guerline Jozef is co-founder and executive director of Haitian Bridge Alliance, an immigrant advocacy organization that provides humanitarian assistance to Haitians and other Black immigrants from the Caribbean and Africa; Erika Guevara-Rosas is a human rights lawyer and Americas director for Amnesty International; and Erika Pinheiro is an immigration attorney and the executive director of Al Otro Lado, a binational nonprofit helping immigrants on both sides of the U.S.-Mexico border.

      • MeduzaOrthodox Patriarch Kirill says he only asked to borrow Rublev’s ‘Trinity’ from Tretyakov Gallery, but Putin gave it back to church outright — Meduza

        Patriarch Kirill, the head of Russian Orthodox Church, says he didn’t ask President Vladimir Putin to give Andrey Rublev’s “Holy Trinity” ikon back to the church.

      • MeduzaRussian FSB develops instructions for conducting searches without court order — Meduza

        Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) has released a set of proposed instructions for how agents should conduct home and automobile searches without court orders.

      • Telex (Hungary)Budapest mayor tells EP Budgetary Control Committee about government measures detrimental to capital

        The European Parliament's Budgetary Control Committee is in Budapest for a three-day visit. Members of the delegation also met the Mayor of Budapest, Gergely Karácsony. The committee asked about the recovery plan submitted by the government and I also made some suggestions, Gergely Karácsony said at a press conference after the meeting.

      • Common DreamsAnd They're Off: GOP Sets Bar So Low and Weird It's Underground and Babbling About Mermaids

        Hoo boy. The GOP primary season got off to a bonkers start in first-in-the-nation Iowa, where smarmy Li'l Ron wowed by keeping his big-boy pants on and taking timid digs at he-who-shall-not-be-named, in absentia 'cause a non-tornado might've mussed his hair. They were joined by a ragtag band of bigots, felons, liars, crackpots, fascists and charlatans - Pastors For Trump! Missing Informants! Seductive Seducing Spirits! - who make Kesey's trippy Merry Pranksters look like Lutheran astrophysicists. Oh, democracy.

      • The NationHiring Tucker Carlson

        Fox thought his prime-time spot was now a blot, But other networks craved him for that slot. Imagine all the feelers that he’s got. The Racist-Preppy Market seems red-hot.

      • The NationTucker’s Hot Air, Off Air
      • Pro PublicaChurches’ Role in TX Election Prompts Calls for Investigations

        Voters in West Texas have decisively rejected three conservative Christian candidates who campaigned on infusing religious values into local decision making. But the support the candidates received from local churches during the race has prompted calls for state and federal investigations and triggered a local political reckoning.

        “I think there should definitely be some penalties,” said Weldon Hurt, a two-term Abilene City Council member who won his race for mayor against one of the candidates. “I don’t know how severe it should be, but I think there has to be a way to curtail this from happening again,” he added. “I think there should be some discipline to these churches.”

      • Patrick BreyerStatement by the Child Protection Association (Der Kinderschutzbund Bundesverband e.V.) on the Public Hearing of the Digital Affairs Committee on “Chat Control”

        The EU initiative sends a clear signal to all EU states to take stronger action against sexualised violence against children. We strongly welcome this. To implement this important goal, the directive proposes necessary and correct measures, but goes too far at crucial points.

      • Patrick BreyerSummary of Statement by the Federal Commissioner for Data Protection and Freedom of Information on the public hearing of the Committee on Digital Affairs of the German Bundestagon the topic of “Chat Control”

        The fight against child sexual abuse is an extremely important social task that must be fulfilled with all suitable and appropriate means at our disposal. The so-called chat control, however, significantly exceeds the goal of this task. It hardly offers greater protection for children, but instead it would be Europe’s and Germany’s entry into a disproportionate, unconditional and comprehensive surveillance of private communication.

      • JURISTChatGPT chief warns US Senate committee to regulate artificial intelligence

        CEO of OpenAI Samuel Altman appeared before the US Senate Subcommittee on Privacy, Technology, and the Law on Tuesday for a hearing about how the US might regulate the use of artificial intelligence (AI) platforms like OpenAI’s ChatGPT. Altman called on the US “to develop regulations that incentivize AI safety while ensuring that people are able to access the technology’s many benefits.”

      • Misinformation/Disinformation/Propaganda

    • Censorship/Free Speech

      • The FireFIRE to Uvalde: Lift ban on father who questioned school safety or we'll sue

        Today, the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression demanded the Uvalde Consolidated Independent School District lift its ban against Adam Martinez, a father of two students in the district. The district banned Martinez from all district property for two years, including from school board meetings. FIRE’s letter to UCISD threatens litigation if the district does not lift the unconstitutional ban by May 22, 2023.

        “My community counts on me to be their voice, but the district wants to shut me up,” said Martinez. “My fight has always been for the 21 people who no longer have a voice and for those who are too scared to speak up about social injustice.”

      • TechdirtTwitter ‘Shadowbans’ Bellingcat After Musk Attacks Them, Then Tries To Retcon A Nonsense Explanation

        Remember, according to Elon Musk, one of the worst things that old Twitter did was “shadowban” people. There was a whole “Twitter Files” about the practice, which Musk insisted was a horrible practice that was censorship. Except… at the same time he had no problem using it to silence accounts he personally disliked. Hilariously, he announced this as part of his “new Twitter policy” back in November, even though it had been existing Twitter policy since 2018.

      • TechdirtAge Verification Laws Are Terrible

        Free Speech Coalition, a trade group representing the adult entertainment industry, filed€ a lawsuit€ in the U.S. District Court for the District of Utah to overturn Senate Bill (SB) 287€ – the new law that requires age verification for all adult websites. As I wrote€ about in my last entry for this site, SB 287 prompted the leadership of Pornhub and its network of porn websites to block the whole state of Utah from accessing it in order to avoid potential civil penalties outlined by the new law.

    • Freedom of Information / Freedom of the Press

    • Civil Rights/Policing

      • Robert ReichWhy Child Labor in America is Skyrocketing
      • ReasonWhen This Uvalde Parent Complained About a New Police Hire, He Was Banned From School Property

        Adam Martinez's youngest son was at Robb Elementary on the day of the shooting—though thankfully he was physically unharmed—and, like many other parents, he became a vocal critic of the police department. However, in retaliation for his criticism, the school district banned him from school property—and school board meetings—for two years.

        On Monday, the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE) sent a demand letter requesting that the school lift its two-year ban on Martinez or face a lawsuit.

        "The First Amendment exists so that people can use their voices to advocate for social and political change," FIRE attorney Jeff Zeman said in a Monday press release. "Criticizing the government is protected speech, and Uvalde can't police it."

      • Site36Police violence in Germany is mostly male and more often goes unpunished, research project finds

        The findings presented in KviAPol shed light on the so-called dark field of police assaults, i.e. cases that have not become known and have not been denounced. Under the direction of Tobias Singelnstein, Professor of Criminology and Criminal Law, the researchers Laila Abdul-Rahman, Hannah Espín Grau and Luise Klaus surveyed more than 3,300 participants online and conducted more than 60 qualitative interviews with members of the police and judiciary, victim counselling centres and lawyers.

      • Craig MurrayTrial By Jury

        When I started this blog I never envisaged I would be forced to write a defence of the use of juries in Scotland. We live in troubling times indeed.

      • New York TimesChief of Ukraine Supreme Court Is Arrested and Accused of Bribery

        ‘This is a dark day in the history of the court,’ its judges said.

      • ScheerpostHollywood Writers Have a Word for It: Inequality

        From Cocaine Bear to Panda Express, the fight for a living wage is the same.

      • RFERLRussia Halts Release Of Iranian Film On Serial Killer Of Sex Workers

        Russian authorities have suspended the release of an award-winning film about a serial killer who targets sex workers in Iran.

      • RFERLHomes Of Russian Activists, Journalist Searched

        Police in Russia's Tatarstan region have searched the homes of three rights activists, Vera Otreshko, Zulfia Sitdikova, an unspecified member of the unregistered Libertarian party, and the home of journalist Nailya Mullayeva.

      • RFERLKremlin Critic Says She Experienced Possible Poisoning Symptoms; Report Says Others Also Fell Ill

        Natalia Arno, the U.S.-based chief of the Free Russia Foundation, says there are suspicions she may have been poisoned, "possibly by some nerve agent," after falling ill during a recent trip to Europe, amid reports that at least two other Kremlin critics have experienced similar episodes since 2020.

      • The NationKelly Hayes and Mariame Kaba on Their New Handbook for Radical Organizing

        In Let This Radicalize You: Organizing and the Revolution of Reciprocal Care, Mariame Kaba and Kelly Hayes combine decades of scholarship, countless interviews with activists, and insights from movements across the globe to deliver a utilitarian and practical guide for youth organizers coming into their own. Kaba, a longtime abolitionist organizer and educator, has led numerous organizations to battle the prison-industrial complex and empower young activists, including Project NIA, the Chicago Freedom School, and Interrupting Criminalization. Her blog Prison Culture as well as her anthology We Do This Til We Free Us: Abolitionist Organizing and Transforming Justice have garnered international acclaim. Hayes is an organizer and journalist whose work in outlets like Truthout and Movement Memos has chronicled some of the most important grassroots fights of our time. Kaba and Hayes sat down with Sarah Emily Baum to discuss their new book. This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

    • Monopolies

      • TechdirtWarner Bros. Discovery CEO David Zaslav’s ‘Punishment’ For Disastrous Megamerger? $39 Million.

        We’ve noted in detail how the AT&T/Time Warner/Discovery mergers have been an€ apocalyptic mess€ that aptly demonstrates the U.S. obsession with utterly pointless megadeals and a “growth for growth’s sake” mindset.€ Hundreds of billions of dollars€ later and the companies have produced a product that’s notably shittier than when they started, laying off thousands of people, cancelling popular brands, killing popular magazines, and leaving streaming catalogs with€ new, weird gaps€ due to a€ refusal to pay residuals.

      • Trademarks

        • TechdirtTaco Bell Seeks To Liberate ‘Taco Tuesday’ For Itself, The Masses

          There is a long history of trademark silliness concerning the phrase “Taco Tuesday.” As with many trademark stories, the original sin in all of this was committed by the USPTO , which in the ’80s somehow managed to grant the Taco John’s chain a trademark on the term, despite it being both very descriptive and, after years of lax enforcement, absolutely generic at present. What you will find missing in the stories that we’ve done on this topic in the past is an entity with real weight behind it attempting to invalidate Taco John’s trademark entirely. Sure, everyone from restaurant trade associations to LeBron James (seriously!) have gotten involved, but what we need here is a good old fashioned Goliath to come and stamp out David when he’s misbehaving.

      • Copyrights

        • Creative CommonsMichal ÄŒudrnák — Open Culture VOICES, Season 2 Episode 15

          “If you’re considering opening up, start small” says Michal ÄŒudrnák, the Head of Digital Collections at the Slovak National Gallery. When you open up just a small part first you will see what unfolds and can learn in the process what works for your community and what they interested in and how your community wants to use the cultural heritage in your collection. This episode dives into issues of legislation as well as the unique ways public domain material is re-used.

        • Torrent FreakISPs Block 'Uptobox' to Fight Piracy, Platform & Users Probably Prepared

          A French court has ordered ISPs to block veteran file-hosting/streaming platform Uptobox. French internet users made roughly 10 million visits to Uptobox last month and are unlikely to give up easily. Meanwhile, blundering efforts to block other content led to the entire Telegram platform being blocked in France last weekend. French visitors were diverted to a government website where code linked their visit to serious crime.

        • Torrent FreakManga Publisher Wants Cloudflare to Expose Operators of Popular 'Piracy' Sites

          Manga publisher Shueisha has obtained a subpoena at a California federal court that requires Cloudflare to expose the operators of several piracy-related sites. The targets include 13dl.to, manga-zip.is, wupfile.com and hexupload.net. Each of these sites has millions of monthly users and are predominantly popular in Japan.

        • Press GazetteGoogle traffic worth less than €£75m per year to UK publishers says NMA

          Publishers and platforms disagree over how much they each benefit from each other.

        • TechdirtBungie Wins Default Judgment Against Danish Cheat Purveyor In Ruling That Encourages More CFAA Abuse

          A lawsuit [PDF] against a cheat creator has swung almost completely in Bungie’s direction, mainly thanks to the Danish defendant being unwilling to travel across the pond to defend himself in court. The claims are numerous, ranging from copyright infringement to trademark infringement to CFAA violations to the ever-popular (but rarely successful) RICO.



Recent Techrights' Posts

IBM, Running Out of Things It Can Sell, is Selling Software Patents
IBM is not just pathetic; it's actively harmful because it lobbies for software patents and spreads software patents around
The 'Church' of Moglen/Stallman
'reunion' with Eben Moglen
Microsoft Has Fallen to #3 in Singapore
There are many technically talented people in Singapore or overseas workers who lodge in Singapore
 
As Expected, Facebook Collapses, Microsoft Hides Massive Debt
GAFAM is a giant mountain of debt
At The Register MS "PARTNER CONTENT" Means Company Writing Fake Articles About Itself and Its Own Products
At The Register MS, content-farming has become a thing
Staff of EPO Cautions Against Unlawful Weaponisation of PIPs Against Industrial Actions That Protest Corruption
PIP-like sanctions against anybody who does not toe the line of Cocaine King?
Gemini Links 29/07/2026: Star Trek, Retirement, and ODEs in GNU Octave
Links for the day
Links 29/07/2026: "BuzzFeed Lays Off 33 Percent of Remaining Staff" (Trying LLM Slop Some More), Scam Altman Mocked by the Media
Links for the day
GNOME Curated and Censored by IBM (Under the Guise of "Code of Conduct")
Felipe Borges (IBM) has just posted a follow-up
Digital Mass Surveillance as a Hallmark of Failed Societies
"small leap forward in tech ethics"
I Found a Typo, Don't Vote!
Social control media isn't good at adding any meaningful signal
Jeremy Sands Explained the Harms of Codes of Conduct
next week the 500th show milestone [is reached]
Tonight's Earnings Report From Microsoft and Facebook ('Meta') Will be Faked Because They Hide Almost a Trillion Dollars in Debt
The US economic system is only as honest as the people who govern it
The Vacuum Syndrome
Parables help
The Only Old People Who Can Survive IBM Are the CEO and His Circle of Enablers
very similar to what's happening at the EPO
Microsoft Layoffs Aren't Done Ahead of the Need to Tell Shareholders About "Efficiency" (Tonight)
Microsoft layoffs won't be "Done" until what's left of Microsoft is "None"
Microsoft Lacks Growth. Ahead of 'Results' The UK's Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) Finds Merit in Allegations Slop is Microsoft's Excuse for Price Hikes (Piggybacking Vendor Lock-in).
At this stage it's not hard to see why many nations gravitate away from Microsoft
Parliament leaks confidential cult inquiry witness contact list (COFG Victoria)
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Troll-Feeding is Time-Wasting
in social control media
WordPress is Technical Debt
There are a number of technical tasks underway and maybe some testing (this coming weekend or later)
Will Red Hat Still Exist in 2027 or Just Become a "Brand" at IBM?
Whistleblowers told us IBM was laying off about 500 Red Hat engineers earlier this year
Call for IBM Whistleblowers
If you work for IBM and have something material (like balance sheets) to prove financial misconduct, please try to 'touch base' and establish a secure communication channel we can both use
EPO Series on EU and Pan-European Corruption, Vote-Rigging, Extending Beyond the EPO Itself
By Saturday it will be August already, so we'll start preparing for Rianne's birthday
SLAPP Censorship - Part 133 Out of 200: Lies by Omission
As usual, the other side wants people to ignore how much they lost
European Patent Office (EPO) Series: Streamlining the Decision-Making Process
Negrão was one of 17 applicants for the position but he somehow managed to end up as the sole candidate on the shortlist prepared by the Management Board in June 2020
Links 29/07/2026: "Hugging Face Has a Deepfake Nudes Problem" and "$1.5B Anthropic Copyright Infringement Ruling" (Plagiarism is Not "Training")
Links for the day
Comments on Today's Judgment
It hopefully helps clarify what actually happened
Thank You, Andy
Burnham and "Tech Rights"
Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) Inaction and Incompetence - Part II - 77 Messages Sent, Did Not Even Investigate or Examine Any of the Actual Evidence (British Taxpayers' Money Wasted)
SRA has become known (even notorious) for inaction
Inevitable Politics
In technology, provided the work you do has growing impact (we served almost 2 million requests yesterday), things will inevitably become more political - whether you like it or not does not matter
Not Only "Loonies Take on Farage"
pretending that the opposition to the right wing is "Loonies"
Brigading Against Women - Part I - Bypassing the Legal System by Threatening Companies in Another Continent
In the next part we'll begin to connect Lozza's online activities (and court activities) to those of Garrett
IBM is Trying to Turn Debt (Borrowed Money) Into Fake Growth and It'll Worsen Matters
they put in their balance sheets a fake "growth" in something that does not even exist
Microsoft Relies on Misleading Narrative of Studios Going 'Independent'; in Reality There Are Mass Layoffs in Them
This is not a good narrative for Microsoft
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, July 28, 2026
IRC logs for Tuesday, July 28, 2026
Gemini Links 29/07/2026: Arosa, Tired Tuesday, and Constellation Browser
Links for the day
In IBM, PIPs and RAs (Layoffs) Have Become Almost the Same Thing, Workers 'Expire' With Age (Seniority, Experience) and Empathy is Punishable by Termination
IBM does seem like a dead company
At Microsoft, PIPs Are Sometimes Known as "LITE" (a Silent Layoffs Legal Hack or a Shrewd Workaround to Skirt WARN Act)
Zero "layoffs" to report
Gemini Links 28/07/2026: “Strategies Against Algorithms” and DIYers
Links for the day
"Social Dialogue" With the Man Who Never Faced Real Competition at the European Patent Office (EPO), He Buys the Voters and Eliminates Rivals
Will the "Pretender" write back?
Digital Restrictions (DRM) and Microsoft: What Kills XBox Will Kill Windows Next
Microsoft wrongly and very arrogantly assumed that users would tolerate everything it throws their way
GNU/Linux in Afghanistan Reaches 7%
For many years it was stuck at less than 1%
Greenwashing Corruption With a "Chief Sustainability Officer", Who Infamously Defended Battisetelli's Crimes at the EPO and Petitioned for Him
She was rewarded for conspiring against EPO staff, as usual
What I Explained to Police About Blackmail and Death Threats via Burner Accounts (a Practice Which Generally Constitutes a Crime)
Today I've communicated several times with police
Links 28/07/2026: "People’s Claude Chats Are Publicly Accessible Online" and SpaceX Stock Crashes Like Its Products
Links for the day
UK tech sector missing from democratic process
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
How Not to Cover Elections (Democracy Relies on Reliable, Complete Information)
Misinformed voters are a recipe for disaster
Microsoft E.E.E. (and "Bait and Switch") Going Exactly According to Plan
That is what they are trying to tell us and the companies that employ us
IBM: An Old Company That Hates Old People
Remember that's coming to Red Hat workers in 2 months
Strict Policy on Violence and Violent Language
This matter is now being escalated to law firms
Avoiding Discrimination Against People With Disabilities
work underway to improve the system which runs the sites
Links 28/07/2026: XBox DRM Doomed Everyone (Cannot Play Anything), Slop (Ponzi Scheme) Being Pinkwashed Now
Links for the day
Gemini Links 28/07/2026: Ethics, GIMP Script-Fu, SMTP Versus Gemini, and Proposal for Better TOFU
Links for the day
To a Sociopath, Ethical People Are Bad People. Don't Fall for It.
If you put sociopaths on a pedestal, the pedestal will break
Improving the Static Site Generator
Our system has fixes triaged
Diversity in Debian
bringing up the topic is the real problem, diversity itself is a taboo subject
GNU/Linux in Brazil. The B in BRIC(S).
the "market share" is assessed to be around 5%
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Monday, July 27, 2026
IRC logs for Monday, July 27, 2026
Hate Consumes the Haters
If you hate someone (or something) and you're willing to do anything for "hate rituals", then at the end the emotion will outweigh reason and it'll backfire, surely
GNU/Linux Rises Some More Internationally, statCounter Now Estimates Its Usage on Desktops/Laptops at 7.7%
significant growth for GNU/Linux in Japan, China, Thailand, Vietnam, Indonesia and Cambodia
IBMers on PIPs and the Age (or Cost) Factor
People in their 50s seem to be targeted as they are considered "expensive"
Sad State of Troll-Feeding British Media (Establishment Channels Promoting Total Idiots)
Breeding ignorance means people will assume they have a choice between two pieces of trash: "Nige" or a literal trash can
Links 27/07/2026: Sleepless Japan PM Takaichi Becomes Unpopular and Data Centre Magnate Confiscate Land Without Consent
Links for the day
A Few Hours Ago The Register MS Published an 'Article' With "AI" 32 Times in It, Including First Word in Headline and Summary. It Was Paid SPAM "Sponsored by Hammerspace".
The lost media is engaging in self-harm
Microsoft is Down
This relates in a timely fashion to what we published yesterday
In Techrights, Gemini and HTTP/HTML Are Very Different
Those were never equivalents or mirrors, those are two things that are inherently different and are maintained by different teams
Gemini Links 27/07/2026: Gemified Internet RFCs, “Junk DNA” Is Commented-Out Code, and More
Links for the day
The Techrights Gemini Capsule Was Never a Mirror
Techrights has long taken accessibility quite seriously
Americans Are Not Our Masters
If you are subjected to online abuse, don't give up
Daniel Pocock Campaigns Around "Safety of Children Online" and "Cybersecurity"
There seems to be a growing 'coalition' in the UK based around important issues which impact the entire planet
XBox the Console is Practically Finished (Unofficially), Even the Streaming ("Live") or DRM Service is Dead
XBox has never been closer to profitability
Many CEOs Are Just Glorified Scammers With Suits and Ties
Economies cannot function when few people abuse them for self-enrichment
After statCounter Figures Out Many "Unknowns" Were in Fact GNU/Linux the "Market Share" Estimate in China More Than Doubles
Japan is the same for similar reasons
peppe8o - a Site About Raspberry Pi, Arduino and Electronics - Has Turned Into a Slopfarm
We won't be linking to it anymore
Feeding 'the Children'
Maybe some time soon we'll do a fund-raiser to help feed the birds
Japan: GNU/Linux Crosses the 5% Threshold, Two Years Ago It Was Only 1%
Now it's at over 5%
We Need More Transparency
Our heads of state are very much aware of and concerned about SLAPPs and censorship
"The War on Children" Explained by The Cyber Show
Consumer protection and the war on children
EPO Cocainegate and Current EPO/EU Series to Carry on for Months to Come
Another week has begun
When IBM "Managers Have to Mark 15% of Their Teams as Low Performers" a PIP Means Likely Layoffs (Disguised as a Performance Issue)
"IBM is a Law firm with an I/T department."
Links 27/07/2026: Chatbots Lead to Suicides, Social Control Media Intentionally Designed for Addiction
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Sunday, July 26, 2026
IRC logs for Sunday, July 26, 2026