• Distributions
• Devices/Embedded

Desktop

• My Four-Year-Old Daughter Rejected Windows 10

  Eimi, my four year old daughter, has interacted with Linux-powered computers since she was born. I still remember those nights in which I would pace up and down in my office, holding her and rocking her on my arms while the Linux desktop played music.

  Then, Eimi grew and started enjoying her own room and, rather precociously, discovered how to use desktops and laptops. I will never forget her first encounter with PicarOS, the Linux distro for children!

Kernel Space

• Linux Kernel 3.2.67 LTS Improves Support for Several RISC Microprocessor Architectures

  Ben Hutchings, the maintainer of the Linux 3.2 kernel branch, had the pleasure of announcing the immediate availability for download and upgrade of a new maintenance release for Linux kernel 3.2, version 3.2.67, urging users to update to it as soon as possible. Linux 3.2.67 kernel is a long-term supported version mostly used on very stable environments or embedded systems.

• LLVM Clang Compiling The Linux Kernel Is A Big Topic For 2015

  It’s been talked about for years and is still an ongoing but very active endeavor: building the mainline Linux kernel with LLVM’s Clang compiler rather than GCC.

• pNFS Block Server Support Is Coming To Linux 4.0 (3.20)

  The pNFS block server support for the NFSD kernel code allow for an NFS client connected to a shared disk to do block I/O to that disk in place of NFS reads and writes. pNFS is short for Parallel NFS. By being able to do I/O directly to the shared disk, performance and its parallel abilities can be boosted.

• Linux 4.0-RC1 Tagged, Linux 4.0 Will Bring Many Notable Improvements

  Linus Torvalds has decided to go ahead and rename the Linux 3.20 kernel to Linux 4.0 per his polling last week.

• May the fourth be with you: Torvalds names next Linux v 4.0

• Linus Torvalds runs one of the most world’s important software projects from a tiny ‘Zombie shuffling’ desk

  A computer operating system called Linux powers most of the servers running the Internet, much of the world’s financial trading systems, nearly all of the world’s super computer and is the basis for Android, which runs on tens of millions of Android mobile phones and consumer devices.

  Linux is everywhere and it was the invention of the colorful, brilliant and sometimes controversial Linus Torvalds.

  Linux is an open-source operating system, meaning anyone can use it for free and change it for their own needs. And more than 12,000 developers from more than 1,200 companies have not only done that, but have gotten their work added back to the main Linux project (the “kernel” in geek-speak), according to a recent report from the Linux Foundation.

• Graphics Stack

  • Freedreno Is Providing Good Adreno A4xx Graphics Acceleration

    Rob Clark continues making great progress on his Freedreno Gallium3D graphics driver for providing open-source support for Qualcomm’s Adreno graphics hardware.

Applications

• notifyme: Simple, small and clever

• Danbooru Client 0.2.0 released

  After my previous post, development went quicker than expected, so I’ve actually managed to get a real version out. So without much ado… here’s Danbooru Client 0.2.0!

• GNU Parallel 20150222

• Overview of Three Chat Clients for KDE: Quassel, KVirc and Konversation

  Internet Relay Chat has a history of over 25 years and it is still a widely used text-based protocol for chatting. In the Linux world, each distribution and major project has a chatting room, usually on Freenode, and here you can get online help, participate in collaborative projects, or just have a look at the latest discussions regarding the development of some project or application.

• Instructionals/Technical

  • How To Install Calibre 2.20 On Linux Systems

  • How To Install Whisker Menu 1.5.0 On Xubuntu 15.04, Xubuntu 14.10, Xubuntu 14.04, Xubuntu 12.04, Linux Mint 17.1, Linux Mint 17 And Linux Mint 13 Using XFCE

  • How To Install Wine 1.7.37 On Ubuntu 14.10, Ubuntu 14.04 And Derivative Systems

  • How To Install Wine 1.7.37 On Fedora 21, Fedora 20, CentOS 7, CentOS 6, OpenSUSE 13.2, OpenSUSE 13.1 And OpenSUSE 12.3

  • How To Install Kadu 2.0 On Ubuntu 14.10, Ubuntu 14.04 And Derivative Systems

  • How to disable IPv6 on Linux

• Wine or Emulation

  • Wine-Staging 1.7.37 Brings DXVA2 API Support Over VA-API

    With Wine 1.7.37 having been released on Friday, the Wine-Staging team spent this weekend readying their own spin of this new development version of Wine.

  • Release 1.7.37

    Two weeks passed by and it is time for another Wine release. Before talking too much about Wine staging 1.7.37, we are happy to announce that two important features, UTF-7 support (included since Wine Staging 1.7.29) and interface change notification support (included since first version of Wine Staging) got upstream.

• Games

  • Oddworld: New ‘n’ Tasty To Be Released February 25 on Steam and GOG.com

    Oddworld: New ‘n’ Tasty is a side-scrolling game based on the original game Oddworld: Abe’s Oddysee, released back in 1997. The game has been rewritten from scratch, and comes with new, modern graphics, enhanced audio and revamped gameplay.

  • Victor Vran, An RPG From The Tropico Developers Will Come To Linux

    Victor Vran is a promising RPG in Early Access from the developers of the Tropico games. We have it confirmed from a developer that the game will be on Linux too.

  • Space MMORPG Vendetta Online Is Now Better Optimized for Gamepads

    Vendetta Online, a space MMORPG (massively multiplayer online role-playing game) developed and published by Guild Software Inc that is also available for the Linux platform, has been upgraded again, but this time is just a minor one.

  • Chess in a Few Bytes

    I am showing my age by mentioning that my introduction to computing was a ZX81, a home computer produced by a UK developer (Sinclair Research) which had a whopping 1KB of RAM. The 1KB is not a typographical error, the home computer really shipped with a mere 1KB of onboard memory. But this memory limitation did not prevent enthusiasts producing a huge variety of software. In fact the machine sparked a generation of programming wizards who were forced to get to grips with its workings. The machine was upgradable with a 16KB RAM pack which offered so many more coding possibilities. But the unexpanded 1KB machine still inspired programmers to release remarkable software.

  • Speculation: Here’s The Possible List Of Games Valve Will Demo At GDC

    Thanks to the ever more awesome SteamDB, we have a possible list of games Valve will demo on Steam Machines at GDC, and the list is interesting.

Desktop Environments/WMs

• Xfce 4.12 One Week Away, Xubuntu Technical Lead Says

  According to this blog entry by Sean Davis, Xfce contributor and Xubuntu Technical Lead, Xfce 4.12 is to be released in about one week, this being quite an important announcement, since it comes after almost three years in which no new releases have occurred.

• K Desktop Environment/KDE SC/Qt

  • What’s coming to Green Island: part 2

  • Libinput support added to Touchpad KCM

    As an aftermath of the discussion in Fedora, libinput maintainer Peter Hutter contacted KDE developers, including yours truly who is guilty of porting the kcm-touchpad to KDE Frameworks 5. As I know nothing about input stack or touchpads in general (phew), Peter was kind enough to step up, clone the kcm-touchpad and add support for libinput in addition to (existing) synaptics driver. All I had to do then, is to port it again to Frameworks 5.

  • KDE Touchpad Configuration Now Supports Libinput

    With Libinput support being important not only for Wayland input but also is starting to be used for X11/X.Org input too, the KDE input configuration module now supports configuring libinput devices.

  • Plasma Sprint in Barcelona

    We want to get KInfoCenter out of this “nerdy corner” by augmenting it with rich and beautiful modules and encourage users to check it out. The energy information module is the first step in that direction, other developers have also expressed their interest for that, for instance, it could show much more detailed information about what Baloo is doing at the moment.

  • Kronometer 1.6 released

    Kronometer 1.6 is now available for download. This new release brings an improved UI in the Settings dialog, as well as a couple of annoying bugs fixed.

  • TEA 40.0.0 Released – Qt Text Editor with Many Functions

    TEA is a Qt-based text editor with support for tabs, syntax highlighting, spell-checking, editing support for Wikipedia or LaTex, as well as many configuration options. The latest release, 40.0.0, has been put out earlier today and it represents a major milestone.

• GNOME Desktop/GTK

  • GNOME’s Log-In Screen Will Still Work Without Wayland

    With the just-released GNOME 3.16 Beta there’s a switch to use Wayland by default for the GDM log-in screen. For those wondering what this means to those using binary blob graphics drivers on your systems or in cases where Wayland isn’t working, fear not.

  • GNOME Maps App Can Now Display Contacts with Geocodable Addresses

    The first beta of the upcoming GNOME Maps 3.16 app of the GNOME desktop environment has been announced as part of the GNOME 3.16 Beta 1 release of the controversial desktop environment. In this beta, GNOME Maps received several improvements and bug fixes that we’ve detailed below for your general information.

  • GNOME 3.16 Beta Brings Wayland-Based Log-in Screen

    Matthias Clasen has announced the release of GNOME 3.15.90, the GNOME 3.16 Beta, that’s coming out slightly delayed but still in time for some weekend testing.

    The saturday afternoon release of this first beta in the GNOME 3.15 series brings several more “big features” that have been a priority for the GNOME 3.16 development cycle.

  • Cinnamon 2.6 to Be a Massive Update, Panel Support for Multiple Monitors Incoming

    Cinnamon, a Linux desktop environment developed by the same guys who are also responsible for Linux Mint, will be getting some very important new features with the next 2.6 version that will be out soon.

  • Cinnamon 2.6 brings panels to multiple monitors

    Cinnamon is one of my favorite open source projects because it actually listens to what users ‘need’ and then works on features to fulfill those needs.

    Despite being a full time KDE Plasma user, Cinnamon is one DE that I would be very comfortable with. That doesn’t mean I don’t like Gnome or Unity; I do. It’s just that Plasma and Cinnamon are more suited for my needs – they both are extremely customization and allow me to give a personalized touch to my PC.

Distributions

• Reviews

  • AntiX Linux: A Brief Review

    Certain factors like systemd are polarizing the Linux community. It seems that either you like it or you hate it. Some of the Debian developers are getting nervous and so a fork of Debian called Devuan has been announced.

    I’m always looking at other distros that emphasize compactness and the ability to run on old hardware. I was also intrigued by the Debian controversy with systemd so when I saw AntiX 13.2 was based on Debian Wheezy I had to give it a try. AntiX comes on a single CD so installing it was easy enough.

  • Running Bodhi 3.0.0 Legacy on Older Hardware

    There are many reasons why people use Bodhi Linux. Some use it because they really like the Enlightenment desktop, and Bodhi has pioneered the integration of Enlightenment to create a distro that is both beautiful, elegant and functional. Others use it because they want an operating system that stays out of their way. Again, although Enlightenment offers plenty of whistles and bells for those who need or want them, it can also be configured to be highly minimalist and use a very small amount of system resources.

• New Releases

  • 7.5-TEST-1 Release Notes

    Parsix GNU/Linux 7.5 (code name Rinaldo) brings the latest stable GNOME desktop environment, a new kernel built using our modernized kernel build system, updated installer, a new version of systemd and an upgraded X.Org Server. This version has been synchronized with Debian Wheezy repositories as of February 20, 2015. Thanks to the upgraded X.Org server, there is a noticable desktop performance improvement. Parsix Rinaldo ships with GNOME 3.14 and LibreOffice productivity suit by default. Highlights: GNOME Shell 3.14.3, X.Org 1.16.4, GRUB 2, GNU Iceweasel (Firefox) 35.0.1, GParted 0.12.1, Empathy 3.12.7, LibreOffice 3.5.4, VirtualBox 4.3.18 and a kernel based on Linux 3.14.32 with TuxOnIce 3.3, BFS and other extra patches. Live DVD has been compressed using SquashFS and XZ.

  • Q4OS 0.5.26 version released

    The main purpose of this release is to fix ‘unetbootin’ weighty issue. Some Q4OS USB installation media created with unetbootin utility didn’t correctly extract all the archives and packages. It is now fixed as well as several other bugs. Packages updates and fine tuning of Q4OS Setup utility has been made as well.

• Screenshots

  • Robolinux 7.8.1 KDE Screenshot Tour

• PCLinuxOS/Mageia/Mandriva Family

  • PCLinuxOS, A User friendly Linux Distribution

    PCLinuxOS is one of the many distributions that exist in the world of Linux, but this caught my attention when I installed it on my computer. Let’s take a look at PCLinuxOS, a distro that is user friendly.

  • Mageia 5 Graphics Woes With Intel Broadwell HD Graphics

• Red Hat Family

  • Red Hat announces the availability of Enterprise Linux OpenStack Platform 6 globally

    Red Hat, on Thursday announced the general availability of Red Hat Enterprise Linux OpenStack Platform 6, featuring updates designed to serve as the foundation for building OpenStack-powered clouds for enterprise businesses with advanced cloud users, telecommunications companies, Internet service providers (ISPs), and public cloud hosting providers.

  • 3 trends making CIOs’ jobs even more complex

• Debian Family

  • Derivatives

    • Canonical/Ubuntu

      • Mir Now Depends Upon C++14

        While many open-source projects are still transitioning over to a C++11 code-base, Ubuntu’s Mir display server is already moving onto C++14.

        C++14 was officially released last December as a small update over C++11. While it’s officially just a few months old, GCC and LLVM/Clang have been working on supporting the C++14 changes for some time.

      • Kadu 2.0 Instant Messenger Client Released with Better Ubuntu Unity Support

        After two alphas, one beta, and three RC (Release Candidate) versions, the final release of the anticipated Kadu 2.0 IM client is now available for download. Kadu is an open-source, user-friendly, flexible, and stable Instant Messenger client that supports the Jabber, XMPP, and Gadu-Gadu protocols. Kadu 2.0 is a major release that brings a number of new features and improvements over previous versions.

      • I wrote some more apps for Ubuntu Phone

        As before, all these apps are GPL 3 licensed and available on Launchpad. What’s new is now you can browse them online due to a great unofficial web appstore made by Brian Douglass. This solves one of my previous gripes about not being able to find new applications.

      • Writing Ubuntu Phone Apps Seem Fairly Easy

        Robert Ancell of Canonical posted a new blog post this morning about writing some more apps for Ubuntu Phone. He shows off a simple dice roller app written in just over 400 lines of QML, a morse sender example in less than 600 lines of code, and a yatzy game in less than 1k lines of code all with QML. He’s put out the source to these example Ubuntu Phone apps under the GNU GPLv3.

      • Ubuntu 15.04 to Get Locally Integrated Menus by Default

        Ubuntu 15.04 (Vivid Vervet) will implement Locally Integrated Menus by default, making this a very important change for Unity and the operating system.

      • Canonical targets IoT for critical infrastructure

        The increase in hacking attacks that are aligned to geo-political issues is on the increase. Over the last decade, conflicts on the ground have often spilled over to groups of hackers, some state sponsored and some claiming to act independent of the state. The majority of these hackers have chosen to deface government websites or launch DDoS style attacks to force websites offline.

      • Canonical announces new partnership

      • Flavours and Variants

        • Ubuntu Kylin 14.04.2 LTS Is Out for Chinese Users with Linux Kernel 3.16

          Ubuntu Kylin 14.04.2 LTS, the Chinese Linux distribution developed in collaboration with Canonical, has been released and is now available for download.

Devices/Embedded

• Mini-PC taps RPi Compute Module and supports RPi 2

  For almost a year, the Raspberry Pi Compute Module has served the needs of professional embedded vendors looking to ship commercial devices based on the Raspberry Pi SBC. However, this computer-on-module (COM) version of the RPi Model B can be tricky for less experienced hardware developers. On Kickstarter, U.K.-based Wireless Things has successfully funded an “OpenPi” mini-PC based on the module designed primarily for software developers.

• Phones

  • Android

    • Create a new Access Point Name on your Android device

      If you have an unlocked Android device and want to use it on a different carrier network, you might have to add a new Access Point Name. Jack Wallen shows you how.

    • Samsung Galaxy Note Series Android 5.0 Lollipop Update Roundup

      Samsung has made significant progress recently in rolling out the new Android 5.0 Lollipop OS update to phablets in its Galaxy Note series. Here’s a roundup of devices and carriers that have implemented the update so far, and which are expected.

    • Android Lollipop lets you tweak some settings using voice commands

    • Developer MohammadAG gets Android Wear to work with iPhones, sort of

      Google has hinted that it could eventually make Android Wear work with iPhones, but as the wearables platform is getting close to its first birthday, we’re yet to see an official integration. The good news is, if you really want to use your Android Wear smartwatch with an iOS device, an unofficial solution may be coming.

    • Android Wear works with iPhones and iPads — no jailbreak required!

    • Super Subtle: Swipe Once To Close The Quick Settings Panel And Unlock Your Device From The Lockscreen

      In case you haven’t noticed, we love tiny details that make our everyday lives as Android users better. (And really, in case you didn’t notice that, I’ll show you the door — it’s that X button next to the tab title up there in your browser.) Our friendly Android 5.1 tipster Ramit Suri loves them too, so much in fact that he noticed a teeny tiny detail on the lockscreen.

    • Upcoming Android Phones 2015: Lenovo Set To Unveil Its First Smartphone That Has A Stylus

      Unfortunately, unlike the first four devices which had official renders, the Vibe Max did not come with any – so Lenovo and Android fans would have to wait a few more days before seeing the company’s latest flagship.

    • iFlix: Instantly Watch & Listen to Torrents on Android

      A new app for Android makes viewing torrents easier than ever before. After simply clicking on a magnet link, iFlix takes over, playing video and music in a clean interface. There’s no need to wait for a torrent to complete and skipping can be achieved in just a few moments.

    • [Android 5.1 Feature Spotlight] Clearer Instructions And Less Hassle In The Screen Pinning Interface And Settings

      We’re back — and by we, I mean our best bro in the world, Ramit Suri — with another Android 5.1 interface change. This one is all about the screen pinning feature that was introduced with Android 5.0, which receives a small but useful facelift and an interesting change to its settings.

Events

• SCALE 13x, Day 2: Knock on Wood

  The day Saturday started with Monty Taylor’s Flying Circus. HP’s Monty Taylor, accompanied by his rubber duck, gave an insightful talk on the direction of Open Source and how media-fabricated one-liners — akin to the misconception that lemmings jump off cliffs — affect the tech industry and, more importantly, what can be done about it.

Openness/Sharing

• OpenStack at Walmart, project reform status, and more

• Open Data

  • 3 ways open data is revolutionizing product development

    Somewhere between these two factors — what people really need and don’t have on one end, and what technologies can make a meaningful impact on the other — lies the sweet spot where the next breakthrough product is waiting. And as some leading companies have started to discover, open source data can lead you straight to it. Most recently I witnessed this play out with a company in medical device development — although the learnings from their experience are applicable across industries. Here’s why:

American Airlines Strands Luggage From Multiple Flights In Miami; Blames ‘Technical Issue’

MIA may be the airport code for Miami International Airport, but it’s also the state of luggage for hundreds — if not thousands — of passengers flying on American Airlines out of Miami on Friday: missing in action.

An apparent “technical issue” with its baggage conveyor belts at Miami International Airport prevented American Airlines from loading any planes with checked luggage on Friday. For eight hours, the airline let its flights depart sans bags, but did not notify passengers of the issue. Instead, most passengers discovered when they reached their destinations that their luggage hadn’t.

Science

• Google boss warns of ‘forgotten century’ with email and photos at risk

  Humanity’s first steps into the digital world could be lost to future historians, Vint Cerf told the American Association for the Advancement of Science’s annual meeting in San Jose, California, warning that we faced a “forgotten generation, or even a forgotten century” through what he called “bit rot”, where old computer files become useless junk.

Health/Nutrition

• Owen Paterson gets his facts wrong in pro-GMO push

  An emotive press release hypes the visit to South Africa by the discredited former UK environment secretary Owen Paterson. The press release, sent from the right-wing think-tank that Paterson founded, UK2020, accuses the European Union and Greenpeace of “condemning millions of people in developing countries to starvation and death by their stubborn refusal to accept the benefits of genetically modified crops and other potentially life-saving advances in plant sciences.”

Security

• Lenovo: Avoid!

  As for me, I will not be buying a Lenovo computer, ever.

• A Bit Late, But Lenovo CTO Admits The Company Screwed Up

  We’ve had a bunch of posts today (and yesterday) about the “Superfish” debacle, with a few of them focusing on Lenovo failing to recognize what a problem it was — first denying any serious security problem, and then calling it “theoretical.” It appears that Lenovo has now realized it totally screwed up and is finally saying so.

• Dear Lenovo, it’s not me, it’s you.

  I’ve been a mostly happy Thinkpad owner for almost 15 years. My first Thinkpad was a 570, followed by an X40, an X61s, and an X220. There might have been one more in there, my archives only go back a decade. Although it’s lately gotten harder to buy Thinkpads at UNB as Dell gets better contracts with our purchasing people, I’ve persevered, mainly because I’m used to the Trackpoint, and I like the availability of hardware service manuals. Overall I’ve been pleased with the engineering of the X series.

• Superfish means its time to replace your Lenovo computer

  Lenovo is all over the media recently, and not for a good reason. The revelation that it corrupted its computers with the vile Superfish adware has shocked many people in the computing world. It’s almost impossible to believe that a company could be so incredibly stupid and so unbelievably uncaring about the security of its customers.

Defence/Police/Secrecy/Aggression

• What Would Malcolm X Think?

  FIFTY years ago today my father, Malcolm X, was assassinated…

• Australia rules out Sweden for $39 billion submarine contract

  Australia will not partner with Sweden to build its next-generation submarine fleet, Prime Minister Tony Abbott said on Friday, narrowing the list of potential partners for the A$50 billion ($39 billion) program to Germany, France and Japan.

  Swedish defense firm Saab, France’s state-controlled naval contractor DCNS and Germany’s ThyssenKrupp Marine Systems have expressed interest in the project.

• Pakistan Army increasing cooperation with CIA on drone strikes after Peshawar massacre, expert says

  The Pakistan Army is once again cooperating with the US on drone strikes, a renowned expert on the country’s military tells the Bureau in the latest edition of Drone News.

• CIA-planted ‘evidence’ may force IAEA review of Iran’s alleged nuke arms program – report

  Doctored blueprints for nuclear weapon components supplied to Iran by the CIA 15 years ago could force the IAEA to review its conclusions on Iran’s atomic program, which was potentially based on misleading intelligence, Bloomberg reports.

  The details of the Central Intelligence Agency operation back in 2000 were made public as part of a judicial hearing into a case involving Jeffrey Sterling, an agent convicted of leaking classified information on CIA spying against Iran.

• CIA’s Nuclear-Bomb Sting Said to Spur Review in Iran Arms Case

  Details of a 15-year-old Central Intelligence Agency sting emerging from a court case in the U.S. may prompt United Nations monitors to reassess some evidence related to Iran’s alleged nuclear weapons work, two western diplomats said.

  International Atomic Energy Agency inspectors in Vienna will probably review intelligence they received about Iran as a result of the revelations, said the two diplomats who are familiar with the IAEA’s Iran file and asked not to be named because the details are confidential. The CIA passed doctored blueprints for nuclear-weapon components to Iran in February 2000, trial documents have shown.

• The CIA Once Ran Brothels And Dosed Unsuspecting Customers With LSD

  For ten years during the Cold War, the CIA conducted mind-control experiments on unsuspecting San Franciscans. Dubbed Operation Midnight Climax, the program was packed with salacious details: a power-mad narcotics agent, a brothel equipped with two-way mirrors, and gallons of LSD.

• Christian War Crimes Prize

  After destroying Hiroshima, President Truman offered thanks to God for the power to kill indiscriminately…

• The Israeli agent behind enemy lines

  “The Israeli intelligence services paid me to complete certain missions, such as secret missions in Syria under the cover of a reporter. These missions were at times very dangerous, and I risked the worst, including death in the case of failure. I traveled to Damascus a number of time in order to make contact with the local elite, doctors, researchers and others – all of whom wanted to emigrate to the United States. Every time I would get the equivalent to a month’s wage.”

• David Swanson – Not Very Funny

  More broadly, Jeb pushed the idea that the Middle East is a disaster because it hasn’t been bombed enough, and that the U.S. is disliked because it hasn’t attacked enough countries. There are two problems with this. One, it’s a disgusting and ridiculous lie that has been getting people killed for many years. A Gallup poll early last year of 65 countries found the U.S. to be considered far and away the biggest threat to peace in the world. The nations in the worst shape are the ones the U.S. has bombed. U.S. ambassador to the UN Samantha Powers has actually argued that we should stop paying attention to what bombing Libya did to Libya in order to be sufficiently willing to bomb Iraq and Syria. ISIS actually produced a 60-minute movie begging the United States to go to war against it because recruitment would soar. The U.S. obliged. Recruitment soared. This is how disliked the United States has made itself: organizations are willing to be bombed if it will show them to be the leading opponents of the United States — a country that, by the way, puts over a trillion dollars a year into war when tens of billions could address world hunger, clean water, and other basic needs. For a fraction of war spending, the U.S. could address climate chaos, agriculture, education, etc., and become the most loved government on earth. But would that feel as good as screaming threats at ISIS?

• Russia Bashing Big Lies Persist

  They report nothing about Washington supplying Kiev with heavy weapons since the conflict began last year.

• O’Reilly’s “Combat Situation” Reporting Problem Just Got Worse

  Seven of Bill O’Reilly’s former CBS News colleagues who were with the Fox host in Buenos Aires have challenged his account of the riot he has recently come under fire for describing as a “combat situation.” As contradictions to O’Reilly’s account of his 1982 reporting on the Falklands War build, O’Reilly has responded to critics with personal attacks.

• On CNN’s Reliable Sources, Media Critics Dissect O’Reilly’s Politicization Of Criticism Of His Falklands War Reporting

• Former CBS News Colleague Contradicts O’Reilly’s Story About Argentina Protest After Falkland Islands War

• Bill O’Reilly: Former CBS News Correspondent Eric Engberg “Is A Coward” For Criticizing His Falklands War Reporting

• Turkish Forces Attack Syrian Troops

  Former US ambassador to Syria Robert Ford admits moderates don’t exist in numbers and motivation enough to matter.

• Argentina charges US interference in crisis over prosecutor’s death

  The political crisis precipitated by the mysterious January 18 death of Alberto Nisman has continued to deepen after a mass march called by fellow prosecutors and backed by the government’s right-wing opponents drew large crowds into the streets of Buenos Aires Wednesday to mark one month since the Argentine federal prosecutor was found with a fatal bullet wound to his head.

• Failing Tonkin Gulf Test on Ukraine

  For instance, Congress could investigate the role of Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland and U.S. Ambassador Geoffrey Pyatt in orchestrating the political crisis that led to a violent coup overthrowing Ukraine’s constitutionally elected President Viktor Yanukovych a year ago.

• RABBLE ROUSER: Peace activists give food for thought

  He reminded us that in Nazi Germany, many people had to look the other way to allow for the horrendous atrocities while others risked their lives and paid a high price. He also pointed to the historical reality of the FBI illegally spying on both blacks and Peace Groups during the Vietnam era.

• Gallup: Americans’ Fear of Russia Soars

  Gallup headlined on February 16th, “Americans Increasingly See Russia as Threat, Top U.S. Enemy,” and reported that whereas back in 2011 only 3% of Americans answered “Russia” when asked “What country anywhere in the world do you consider to be the United States’ greatest enemy?” 18% cite “Russia” today, which is 3% more than the #2-cited threat, “North Korea,” cited now by 15% (which had been 16% back in 2011, when the top-cited threat of all was then Iran, at 25%, which is now cited by only 9% of Americans, as being America’s “greatest enemy.”

• America Threatens to Wage War on Russia: “US public is being Prepped to Hate Russians and to Fear Russia”

  Gallup headlined on February 16th, “Americans Increasingly See Russia as Threat, Top U.S. Enemy,” and reported that whereas back in 2011 only 3% of Americans answered “Russia” when asked “What country anywhere in the world do you consider to be the United States’ greatest enemy?” 18% cite “Russia” today, which is 3% more than the #2-cited threat, “North Korea,” cited now by 15% (which had been 16% back in 2011, when the top-cited threat of all was then Iran, at 25%, which is now cited by only 9% of Americans, as being America’s “greatest enemy.”

• Swedish migrant aides ‘were Isis recruiters’

  Sweden’s national job agency has sacked its whole network of immigrant resettlement assistants after suspicion that some of them may have tried to recruit newly arrived immigrants to jihadist-style militant groups, such as Isis.

• US Backing for ‘Moderate’ Syrian Rebels: Long Reported, Continually Forgotten

  The Guardian story cited the Pentagon in acknowledging that “a small group of US special forces and military planners had been to Jordan during the summer to help…train selected rebel fighters.”

• America loves its war porn: “American Sniper” and the Hollywood propaganda machine

  In the age of the all-volunteer military and an endless stream of war zone losses and ties, it can be hard to keep Homeland enthusiasm up for perpetual war. After all, you don’t get a 9/11 every year to refresh those images of the barbarians at the airport departure gates. In the meantime, Americans are clearly finding it difficult to remain emotionally roiled up about our confusing wars in Syria and Iraq, the sputtering one in Afghanistan, and various raids, drone attacks, and minor conflicts elsewhere.

Transparency Reporting

• How much is a secret worth?

  MuckRock is an organization that charges people — journalists, researchers, citizens — to file information requests…

• Laura Poitras: People Must Stand Up For Whistleblowers Who Risk Their Lives

Environment/Energy/Wildlife

• World Bank Refuses to Consider Haitian Communities’ Complaint about New Mining Law

  Last week, the World Bank Inspection Panel refused to consider a complaint from Haitian communities about the Bank’s support for development of the mining sector in Haiti. Communities affected by mining activity and the Justice in Mining Collective, a group of six Haitian civil society organizations, submitted the complaint in early January, alleging violations of their rights to information and participation and threats of human rights abuses and environmental harms. The Inspection Panel—an office established to address complaints from people affected by World Bank-sponsored projects—recognized that the complaint raised “serious and legitimate” concerns and that the mining industry presents significant risks. The office nevertheless denied the complaint on narrow, technical grounds. The complainants expect to receive a copy of the decision in French today.[1]

Finance

• In Remarks on Obama, Rudy Giuliani to the Core

  It has been years since he disclosed his assets, but Mr. Giuliani revealed as a presidential candidate that his personal wealth had ballooned from a modest sum when he left City Hall to more than $30 million in 2007.

• Straw and Rifkind deny ‘cash for access’ wrongdoing

  Two former foreign secretaries have been secretly filmed apparently offering their services to a private company for thousands of pounds.

• Jack Straw and Malcolm Rifkind face ‘cash for access’ allegations

  Two former foreign secretaries are facing accusations of being involved in a new “cash for access” scandal by offering to use their political influence in return for payment.

• ‘Cash for access’ scandal: How to buy a politician

  The Telegraph looks at how to buy a politician, including Jack Straw and Sir Malcolm Rifkind

• Hillary Clinton’s Complex Corporate Ties

  Among recent secretaries of state, Hillary Clinton was one of the most aggressive global cheerleaders for American companies, pushing governments to sign deals and change policies to the advantage of corporate giants such as General Electric Co., Exxon Mobil Corp., Microsoft Corp. and Boeing Co.

• Hillary, Jeb and $$$$$$

  This was on top of another $4 million that he reportedly netted the previous week in one evening alone at the Manhattan home of a private equity bigwig. After Manhattan came the Washington, D.C., area, where he racked up $1 million at two events, according to Politico. An atlas of cities, an avalanche of dough: It’s what successful campaigns are made of, and his is expected to raise between $50 million and $100 million over a span of three months.

PR/AstroTurf/Lobbying

• Denying History: Cuba in the German Liberal Press

  The U.S.-Cuban negotiations were extensively discussed in the liberal German press. A closer reading of the news indicated a slant in coverage: Cuba was depicted as a terror state and a nefarious actor. The USA, on the other hand, was described as a benign actor with noble aims such as to bring democracy and reforms to Cuba.

• Reel life is often significantly different than real life — even for Academy Award winners

  Reel life is often significantly different than real life — even for Academy Award winners. Here are eight movies that got their facts wrong.

• So who is the Biggest Prevaricator: Brian Williams or Bill O’Reilly?

  According to David Corn’s February 19, 2015 article “Bill O’Reilly Has His Own Brian Williams Problem” in Mother Jones–the Fox News host stands accused of making false claims of stolen valor, similar in nature to those made by NBC News anchor Brian Williams. This despite O’Reilly’s feigned outrage at the hypocrisy of Mr. Williams. The article cited several instances of O’Reilly’s own historic, documented duplicity, but there was another one which went unreported that came from his own words as written within one of O’Reilly’s own books.

• Erick Erickson Follows Scott Walker In Questioning Obama’s Christianity

  Fox contributor Erick Erickson parroted Governor Scott Walker (R-WI) to cast doubt on President Obama’s Christianity, alleging he is not a Christian “in any meaningful way,” despite the fact that right-wing attempts to call Obama’s faith into question have long been discredited.

• The Sexist Attacks On Women For Saying The Same Thing As Men

  The National Review’s Ian Tuttle called the two women an incapable “hapless duo” with a “Lucy and Ethel routine” (Harf is blonde, Psaki a red head) who were trying to create a version of the comedy film Legally Blonde at the US Department of State. In a separate piece, the conservative journal of record’s Kevin Williamson called Harf “cretinous” and a “misfit who plays Messy Marvin to Jen Psaki’s feckless Pippi Longstocking.”

Censorship

• Guardian ‘changed Iraq article to avoid offending Apple’

  Guardian facing series of allegations from insiders over its relationship with advertisers, including suggestions that it changed an article on Iraq amid concerns that Apple would object

• Tumblr Censors “Torrent” Related Tags and Searches

  Popular blogging platform Tumblr is hiding “torrent” related posts from public view. The term “torrent” has been added to the site’s adult filter, to prevent people from stumbling upon “offensive” content.

• Zimbabwe’s censorship board demands that erotic scenes of Fifty Shades of Grey film be edited

• Zimbabwe: censorship board demands that erotic scenes of “Fifty Shades of Grey” film be edited

  Zimbabweans going to the movies will have to watch a tame version of “Fifty Shades of Grey” after censors ordered an edit of the film adaption of the bestselling erotic novel.

  The censors demanded that erotic scenes from the R-rated drama be deleted before it is shown in the southern African country.

• Zimbabwe: ‘Fifty Shades of Grey’ not a hit after censors delete scenes, theaters withdraw film

  Zimbabweans going to the movies had to watch a tame version of “Fifty Shades of Grey” after censors ordered an edit of the film adaption of the bestselling erotic novel. Now the film has been removed by movie distributors who say the edits hack away too much of the story.

• When online censorship is beautiful

  When Mishka Henner, a 38-year-old artist and photographer, came across these “blurred” images of Dutch landscapes on Google Maps, he was similarly perplexed and amused.

• EFJ to Hahn: Media censorship is a reality in Serbia

  According to a survey published by the EFJ affiliate, the Serbian Journalists Association (UNS), in December, about 40% of journalists reported being occasionally subjected to censorship.

• Literary censorship in the era of internet

  “You try to oppress something, it comes to haunt with a vengeance,” Singh said.

• “Free speech”, featuring elitist lies and censorship of the oppressed

  In a place of elite commentary and closed exclusive media with no reader engagement, is there freedom of speech?

• End to Censorship: Freedom Of Speech! Freedom To Read!

  The censorship of books is and will probably always be a source of controversy. Everyone has a different opinion as to what is appropriate. And ultimately, it’s up to each individual to decide if they want to read the novel or not and if they are mature enough to. Below are the ten most frequently challenged works of 2013 according to the American Library Association.

• The Anti-Information Age

  How governments are reinventing censorship in the 21st century

• Kuwait court hands down two years jail sentence for insulting emir

  A Kuwaiti appeals court on Sunday sentenced an opposition politician to two years in jail for insulting the country’s ruler, local media reported.

  Defense lawyers said they intend to appeal the ruling against Musallam al-Barrak, an outspoken former member of parliament, to the highest court, news website alaan.cc said. Other news websites carried similar reports.

Privacy

• Laura Poitras’ CITIZENFOUR Awarded Oscar for Best Documentary in 2014

  CITIZENFOUR, Laura Poitras’ riveting documentary about Edward Snowden’s efforts to shed light on gross surveillance abuses by the United States government and its partners, just won the 2014 Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature. Tonight’s Oscar win recognizes not only the incredible cinematography of Poitras, but also her daring work with a high-stakes whistleblower and the journalism that kick-started a worldwide debate about surveillance and government transparency. We suspect this award was also, as the New York Times pointed out, “a way for Academy members to make something of a political statement, without having to put their own reputations on the line.”

• Citizenfour: Inside Story of NSA Leaker Edward Snowden Captured in New Film by Laura Poitras

  “At this stage I can offer nothing more than my word. I am a senior government employee in the intelligence community. I hope you understand that contacting you is extremely high risk … This will not be a waste of your time.” This was one of the first messages Edward Snowden wrote to filmmaker Laura Poitras beginning an exchange that helped expose the massive surveillance apparatus set up by the National Security Agency. Months later, Poitras would meet Snowden for the first time in a Hong Kong hotel room. Poitras filmed more than 20 hours of footage as Snowden debriefed reporters Glenn Greenwald and Ewen MacAskill. That footage — most unseen until now — forms the backbone of Poitras’ new film, “Citizenfour.” She joins us to talk about the film and her own experience with government surveillance. The film is the third installment of her 9/11 trilogy that also includes “My Country, My Country” about the Iraq War and “The Oath” about the U.S. military base at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. Poitras’ NSA reporting contributed to a Pulitzer Prize for Public Service awarded to The Guardian and The Washington Post. We also speak with Jeremy Scahill, who appears in the film reporting on recent disclosures about NSA surveillance from a new, anonymous government source. Scahill, along with Poitras and Greenwald, founded The Intercept, a new media venture to continue investigating whistleblower leaks.

• Laura Poitras and Glenn Greenwald on Government Surveillance

  Laura Poitras, nominated for best documentary for “Citizenfour,” said she had seen some changes as a result of her film, about the whistleblower Edward Snowden and his revelations of government surveillance.

• Laura Poitras on Her Oscar-Nominated Snowden Doc Citizenfour

  When we sit down in her New York office on the evening of February 14, I wish Laura Poitras a happy Valentine’s Day. “Oh, is that today?” she replies. The filmmaker has ample reasons to be unaware of ordinary reality. It has been two years since, while making a documentary about government surveillance of citizens, she received an encrypted email from a correspondent who identified himself only as “citizenfour.” The anonymous emailer turned out, of course, to be Edward Snowden. Since Citizenfour was released to great acclaim last October, she has been in constant motion, mostly outside the U.S. Two nights before we meet, she and Glenn Greenwald were joined, via satellite link from Moscow, by a smiling, relaxed Snowden for discussions at New York’s IFC Center and the New School. The current week contains two more milestones in the film’s remarkable career: It is the odds-on favorite to win Best Documentary at the Oscars this Sunday; the following night, it will have its first telecast on HBO.

• Edward Snowden Congratulates Laura Poitras for Winning Best Documentary Oscar for Citizenfour

  The following is a statement from Edward Snowden provided to the American Civil Liberties Union, which represents him…

• Why Kaspersky was right to reveal NSA secrets

  This means that the NSA likely had help from the corporations that build the hard drives and USB devices in question, because they’d have no access to the source code otherwise, according to Reuters. It opens up the possibility that the NSA used an American company’s cooperation with a foreign company on projects as an invitation to steal the American company’s proprietary information, too, even though U.S. law explicitly prohibits this type of covert operation.

• Wanda Sykes on Working at the NSA, Coming Out, & Shooing the FLOTUS Away

  Before her career in comedy, Sykes got, as she called it, “a good government job.” She worked for the NSA and, when prompted, confessed that “yes, she learned some things that were surprising.” She did not elaborate, maybe because it was long ago, or maybe because none of us had the proper clearance.

• Jeb Bush: ‘I don’t understand’ why anyone is upset about the NSA

• Jeb Bush Backs NSA Powers

• Find out if the UK used NSA data to spy on you

  While it’s sadly likely that your communications have passed through an intelligence agency at some point, it’s usually difficult to know just who got your data. However, you now have a rare opportunity to find out.

• Kaspersky Lab Cannot Confirm NSA Behind Espionage Program on 30 Countries

  Ealier this week, the Moscow-based internet security company published a report saying that spying software operated by a hacker group had infected over 500 computers in over 30 countries including Iran, Russia, China and Syria. The revelations triggered media reports about the US NSA being behind the espionage.

• Hard-drive spy malware linked to NSA

  A powerful cyberspying tool can tap into millions of computers worldwide through secretly installed malware, security researchers say, with many signs pointing to a US-led effort.

• NSA spied through Seagate, Micron, Western Digital gear, Russian researchers say (Correction)

  The NSA’s spy programs can function in disk drives sold by more than a dozen companies, which means just about every computer on the market vulnerable to eavesdropping. Kaspersky Lab, a Moscow-based security software maker, discovered that implants could be placed by what it called the “Equation Group,” a reference to the NSA. The finding was confirmed by Reuters via a former NSA employee.

• Vermont Legislation Goes Head-to-Head with NSA Spying

  A bill filed in the Vermont House last week represents a transpartisan effort taking on the surveillance state. The legislation would not only support efforts to turn off NSA’s water in Utah, but would have practical effects on federal surveillance programs if passed.

  Vermont Rep. Teo Zagar (D-Barnard) introduced H.204 on Feb. 12. His three cosponsors literally span the political spectrum, including a Republican, an Independent and a member of the Progressive Party.

• FBI surveillance tactics jeopardized by fight over NSA phone snooping program

• NSA Spy Hacking Undermines US Credibility Over Outlawing Cyberattacks

  The United States is planning to create a new agency dedicated to cybersecurity in light of the growing number of hacking attacks and identity theft in the past year.

• Fresh Insights into the NSA’s Cyber Capabilities

  It is widely known that the National Security Agency houses an impressive cyber force with the capacity to bypass the digital defenses of private individuals, enterprises, and even foreign governments – a force powerful enough to draw criticism from the American public and American allies. A recent report from Russian researchers has provided more specific information vis-à-vis the technical capabilities of NSA.

• Citizenfour: meet NSA whistleblower Snowden

  Last year, Attorney-General George Brandis introduced legislation to Parliament which, if passed, would require telecom companies to retain metadata for two years. Last week, in the 100-seat Parliament House theatre located just next door, politicians and journalists gathered to watch an advance screening of documentary Citizenfour. The film follows whistleblower Edward Snowden as he reveals the extent of the National Security Agency’s domestic surveillance program. It is a must-see: a poignant reminder of the dangers posed to individual privacy and security by data collection.

• The NSA’s Snooping Reaches Insane New Levels. You Can’t Do A Thing About It.

  Apparently, the United States National Security Agency has been spying on computers used in several countries through software buried within hard drives manufactured by big companies such as Seagate, Toshiba and Western Digital.

  Security researchers at Moscow-based Kaspersky Lab discovered personal computers in 30 countries infected with one or more of the spying programs. The most infections were found in Iran, along with computers in Russia, Pakistan, Afghanistan, China, Mali, Syria, Yemen and Algeria.

• Russia Improving Electronic Security in Response to NSA Spyware – Lawmaker

  The remark follows an announcement made on Monday by Kaspersky Lab, a Moscow-based Internet security software company, on a broad surveillance program that was tracking data on computer hard disks worldwide. The company said a cyberattack team known as the Equation Group had infected the computers of 500 organizations worldwide with spying software, most of them in Iran and Russia.

• ​Criminally insane irresponsibility led to modern ‘hacker’s paradise’

  The US government has been irresponsible about cyber security for the past 25 years, essentially allowing the NSA to create a ‘hackers paradise’ through numerous infantile backdoors they planted, former US intelligence officer Robert Steele told RT.

• Find Out if You’ve Been Spied on—and Join the Fight for Privacy

  Want to know if GCHQ spied on you? Now you can find out. Privacy International (PI) has just launched a website that lets anyone find out if their communications were intercepted by the NSA and then shared with GCHQ.

• Oliver Stone’s Edward Snowden film set for Christmas release

  Oscar-winning director Oliver Stone’s big-screen dramatisation of Edward Snowden’s mass surveillance revelations will be released on 25 December, distributor Open Road Films said on Friday.

  Snowden will star Joseph Gordon-Levitt as the NSA whistleblower who leaked details of US and British surveillance and electronic monitoring programs.

  Filming has begun in Munich and will move to other locations before its expected completion in May.

  Shailene Woodley, Melissa Leo, Zachary Quinto and Tom Wilkinson will also star in the film, adapted from two books, The Snowden Files, by Guardian journalist Luke Harding and Time of the Octopus by Anatoly Kucherena, Snowden’s lawyer.

• Timothy Olyphant Joins Oliver Stone’s Edward Snowden Movie

• Oliver Stone’s Edward Snowden biopic to open on Christmas Day

  Stone is also adapting the screenplay with Kieran Fitzgerald, from Luke Harding’s The Snowden Files: The Inside Story of the World’s Most Wanted Man and Anatoly Kucherena’s Time of the Octopus.

• You can now find out if GCHQ spied on you

  People from around the world can join a campaign to find out if British intelligence agency GCHQ illegally spied on them — and force it to delete the data.

  The move follows a ruling by the UK’s Investigatory Powers Tribunal (IPT) that GCHQ’s use of data gathered by the National Security Agency (NSA) in the US was unlawful prior to December 2014.

• Snowden Documentary Earns Ridenhour Film Prize

  The Ridenhour Prizes announced Friday its documentary prize will go to “Citizenfour,” the film about Edward Snowden’s leaks of classified NSA documents, directed by Laura Poitras.

• Director Laura Poitras accepts the award for best documentary for her film “Citizenfour” at the 2015 Film Independent Spirit Awards in Santa Monica

• SA’s securocrats serious about cyberwarfare

  Shortly after 9/11, the South African government introduced measures to fight terrorism in the country, including a bill allowing the monitoring and interception of communications. It became the Regulation of Interception of Communications and Provision of Communication-Related Information Act (Rica) of 2002. It replaced the Interception and Monitoring Prohibition Act of 1992, which did not deal adequately with technological advances.

• Loopholes exist in our laws covering interception of communications, and the state is abusing them.

  Shortly after 9/11, the South African government introduced measures to fight terrorism in the country, including a Bill allowing the monitoring and interception of communications. It became the Regulation of Interception of Communications and Provision of Communication-Related Information Act (Rica) of 2002. It replaced the Interception and Monitoring Prohibition Act of 1992, which did not deal adequately with technological advances.

• The Spy Cables: A glimpse into the world of espionage

  A digital leak to Al Jazeera of hundreds of secret intelligence documents from the world’s spy agencies has offered an unprecedented insight into operational dealings of the shadowy and highly politicised realm of global espionage.

  Over the coming days, Al Jazeera’s Investigative Unit is publishing The Spy Cables, in collaboration with The Guardian newspaper.

  Spanning a period from 2006 until December 2014, they include detailed briefings and internal analyses written by operatives of South Africa’s State Security Agency (SSA). They also reveal the South Africans’ secret correspondence with the US intelligence agency, the CIA, Britain’s MI6, Israel’s Mossad, Russia’s FSB and Iran’s operatives, as well as dozens of other services from Asia to the Middle East and Africa.

  The files unveil details of how, as the post-apartheid South African state grappled with the challenges of forging new security services, the country became vulnerable to foreign espionage and inundated with warnings related to the US “War on Terror”.

• ‘Overnight, everything I loved was gone’: the internet shaming of Lindsey Stone

  When a friend posted a photograph of charity worker Lindsey Stone on Facebook, she never dreamed she would lose her job and her reputation. Two years on, could she get her life back?

• Why The USA Hacks

  The U.S. government views cyberspace as just another theater of war akin to air, land and sea…

• Alleged NSA Computer Hardware Espionage Not Surprising – Former CIA Officer

  A former CIA and State Department counterterrorism expert says a report by Russia-based Kaspersky Lab that the NSA could have infiltrated computer hardware to spy on foreign entities is not surprising.

• Investigation looks at possible CIA malware plant

  A new report from Russian cybersecurity firm Kaspersky Lab said its researchers identified a new family of malicious programs or worms that infected computers in multiple countries, primarily overseas. Targets appeared to be specifically selected and included military, Islamic activists, energy companies and other businesses, as well as government personnel.

Civil Rights

• The Infamous Oscar Speech Heard Around the World

  Can we all just agree on that point? I’m not saying we owe Michael Moore an apology for the way he was derided for his speech after winning the Academy Award for Bowling for Columbine, 10 years ago, but on this momentous anniversary, I think we can at least acknowledge that much.

  On March 23, 2003, Moore made the Oscar speech heard around the world, in which he condemned George Bush for going to war in Iraq, which had just begun four days prior. And Moore was booed, stalked and threatened for it. He had to get a security detail to protect him from the death threats (some of which were encouraged by the media), and he claims that Homeland Security scratched up his Oscar at the airport on the way home.

• Syracuse University Chancellor Kent Syverud during his one meeting with THE General Body

  THE General Body’s website shows they are connecting with other anti-corporatization student groups, such as those at Colgate University and the University of California.

• Poland to Pay $262,000 to Inmates Held at Secret C.I.A. Prison

• Poland agrees to pay 2 victims of CIA rendition

  Poland will be the first country to pay damages for participating in the US Central Intelligence Agency’s secret rendition programme after its was found to have hosted a facility used for illegal rendition and interrogation.

• CIA terror suspects get pay from Poland

  Poland will pay $262,000 in compensation to two terror suspects who say they were tortured at a CIA secret prison that Poland hosted from 2002-2003, a government minister said Wednesday.

  Foreign Minister Grzegorz Schetyna spoke after the European Court of Human Rights in France rejected Poland’s appeal of its earlier ruling.

• European court rejects Polish appeal in CIA jail case

  The European Court of Human Rights refused on Tuesday to reconsider its ruling that Poland hosted a secret CIA jail, a decision that will now oblige Warsaw to swiftly hold to account Polish officials who allowed the jail to operate.

  The court’s decision will add to pressure on other European countries to end years of secrecy about their involvement in the CIA’s global programme of secret detention after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the United States.

• Poland to Pay €230,000 to Two CIA Detainees Previously Held on Its Soil

• Will the U.S. prosecute torture?

  When America Tonight approached the Justice Department for this report, its press office responded in an email in bold type: “We are not doing interviews.” But in a statement, the agency said that it reviewed the cases of several detainees “alleged to have been mistreated” back in 2009. In the two criminal investigations that resulted, it said it did not find sufficient evidence to “obtain and sustain” convictions.

• Did the Torture Report Give the C.I.A. a Bum Rap?

  IN December, when the Senate Intelligence Committee issued its long-awaited report on the C.I.A.’s detention and interrogation program, it seemed to confirm what I and many human-rights advocates had argued for a decade: The C.I.A. had started and run a fundamentally abusive and counterproductive torture program. What’s more, the report found that the C.I.A. had lied repeatedly about the program’s efficacy, and that it had neither disrupted terror plots nor saved lives.

• Former CIA officer suing agency for wrongful termination

  A former CIA officer who operated under shadowy “non-official cover” status is suing the spy agency in federal court, claiming he was wrongly fired after a senior manager fabricated allegations of misconduct.

  The officer filed the lawsuit in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia under a pseudonym, Mack L. Charles. The CIA declined to comment, but did not dispute the plaintiff’s former association with the agency.

• Fired CIA Worker’s Suit Stymied by State Secrets

  A former CIA operations officer with narcolepsy cannot pursue discrimination charges against the agency because his claims violate state secrets privilege, a federal judge ruled.

  The plaintiff, under the pseudonym Jacob Abilt, claims he divulged his disability to the CIA upon employment when he was hired by the agency in 2008.

  “The parties agreed that as an accommodation of Plaintiff’s disability he could take brief naps at his desk, provided that he make-up the time either by foregoing a lunch break and/or working beyond his scheduled tour of duty,” the complaint says.

• How the CIA gets away with it: Our democracy is their real enemy

  The inside, untold story of CIA’s efforts to mislead Congress — and the people — about torture will horrify you

• He blew the whistle on CIA torture, and now he’s finally home from jail — and talking

  After serving almost two years in a federal prison in Pennsylvania, former CIA officer John Kiriakou, the first agency official to publicly confirm and detail the agency’s use of waterboarding, is back at home in Virginia to complete the rest of his sentence under house arrest.

• CIA Torture Whistleblower: US Government Lacks “the Guts” to Face Its Crimes

  Out of prison and living at home under house arrest for the remainder of a suspended prison sentence, former CIA operative John Kiriakou, convicted and sent to jail for blowing the whistle on agency torture under the Bush administration, has been speaking to major medi outlets this week about the brutal tactics and depraved abuse administered by the U.S. government in the name fighting terrorism as well as his prosecution and conviction under the Espionage Act for speaking out against such crimes.

• The dark comedy of the Senate torture report

  Nevertheless, civic duty spurred me and a lawyer colleague to write the preface. So I read the report — all 500 or so pages of it — first in English and then in French. To my great surprise I learned that the Senate Intelligence Committee Report on Torture moves right along, with an authorial voice, lots of irony and plenty of gruesome detail that wasn’t in the newspapers. The principal writer, a former FBI analyst named Daniel Jones, renders the story of the CIA’s gratuitous brutality with a rhythmic repetition that approaches literature. Again and again, we’re told, detainees were grabbed by the CIA or its proxies, transported to secret prisons, subjected to ‘enhanced interrogation techniques’, and eventually dropped because they didn’t reveal anything useful, or they invented stories, or, as in the case of the suspected Afghan militant Gul Rahman, died. Then, after ploughing through many pages of CIA boasting about success in foiling terrorist plots, we find out that the agency’s ‘representations were almost entirely inaccurate’ and that torture foiled not a single plot. The former FBI man has fun hanging his CIA rivals with their own words, such as when then CIA director Porter Goss briefs senators about how ‘professionally operated’ CIA detention techniques are compared with the Abu Ghraib variety: ‘We are not talking military, and I’m not talking about anything that a contractor might have done… in a prison somewhere or beat somebody or hit somebody with a stick or something.’ No, we’re talking about chaining a prisoner to the ceiling, making him wear a nappy, and letting him soil himself. After slamming him into a wall.

• How Britain’s treatment of ‘The Hooded Men’ during the Troubles became the benchmark for US ‘torture’ in the Middle East

  When Amal Clooney flies into Belfast shortly to meet a group of former Irish prisoners known as ‘The Hooded Men’ it will be the latest chapter of an extraordinary story concerning a quest for justice that has lasted almost half a century.

• Judge who wrote ‘torture memos’ speaks at University of Utah

  One man held a sign reading “Torture Is a War Crime.”

• Torture, terrorism, and paranoia

  Director Adeara Maurice said Why Torture is Wrong highlights the “fear-based culture” surrounding terrorism and homeland security in post-9/11 America.

• Selma Director Ava DuVernay on Hollywood’s Lack of Diversity, Oscar Snub and #OscarsSoWhite Hashtag

  Today we spend the hour with Ava DuVernay, the director of the acclaimed new civil rights film “Selma,” which tells the story of the campaign led by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. to draw the nation’s attention to the struggle for equal voting rights by marching from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama, in March of 1965. While the film has been nominated for an Oscar for best picture, to the shock of many, DuVernay was not nominated. She would have made history as the first African-American woman nominated for best director. At the Sundance Film Festival, DuVernay joins us to discuss the making of the film and the Academy Award nominations. “The question is why was ‘Selma’ the only film that was in the running with people of color for the award?” she asks.

• Verdict expected in trial of 25 Egyptian activists, including Alaa Abdel-Fattah

  An Egyptian court is expected to issue a verdict on Monday in a case which leading activist Alaa Abdel-Fattah and 24 others stand a retrial on a variety of charges, including taking part in an unauthorised protest in 2013.

• David Cole Turns in His Torture Homework Late, Gets a C

  Here, Cole misrepresents the conclusion of the Torture Report, which leads him to a conclusion of limited value. It is not just that CIA lied about whether torture worked.

• Even as Many Eyes Watch, Brutality at Rikers Island Persists

  The brutal confrontations were among 62 cases identified by The New York Times in which inmates were seriously injured by correction officers between last August and January, a period when city and federal officials had become increasingly focused on reining in violence at Rikers.

Intellectual Monopolies

• Copyrights

  • The World’s Most Idiotic Copyright Complaint

    If you can bear to read it the full notice can be found here. Worryingly Total Wipes Music are currently filing notices almost every day. Google rejects many of them but it’s only a matter of time before some sneak through.

• Distributions
• Devices/Embedded

Desktop

• Fully sandboxed, cross-distro Linux apps are almost here

  Right now, you get most of your Linux software from your distribution’s software repositories. Those applications have to be packaged specifically for your Linux distribution, and you have to trust them with full access to your Linux user account and all its files.

  But imagine if developers could distribute applications in a standard way so you could install and run them on any Linux distribution, and if those applications ran in a “sandbox” so you could quickly download and run them without the security and privacy risks.

  That’s not just a dream. It’s the goal of the GNOME desktop-affiliated Sandboxed Applications project, and the first fully sandboxed application is already here. A preliminary version of this project is planned to be released in GNOME 3.16, which should be in the next release of Fedora—Fedora 22.

Kernel Space

• Linus Torvalds: Write Linux Kernel Code, ‘Get Hired Really Quickly’

  It’s a brave endeavour to dive into the source code for any project you didn’t program yourself, another entirely when that project happens to be the guts of Linux. Considering the impact the open source operating system has had on the IT world, having some familiarity with its internals is going to take you places — a sentiment Linux creator Linus Torvalds agrees with.

• New AMD Processors Supported By Coreboot

  While Coreboot support for systems with newer Intel CPUs is tough, Coreboot gained yesterday support for some new AMD CPUs.

• Graphics Stack

  • Nouveau Gallium3D Now Supports Double-Precision Floating-Point Data Types

    Nouveau (NVC0) Gallium3D now supports the GL_ARB_gpu_shader_fp64 extension. What’s exciting about this enablement is that it’s a feature for OpenGL 4.0 / GLSL 4.00 compliance and this Nouveau driver support is beating out the Intel and Radeon drivers in providing this OpenGL capability.

Applications

• genstats: Quick statistical reports

  I can see the usefulness of genstats almost immediately. Given a text file, you can pull out a frequency report with very little effort.

• man-pages-3.80 is released

  I’ve released man-pages-3.80. The release tarball is available on kernel.org. The browsable online pages can be found on man7.org. The Git repository for man-pages is available on kernel.org.

• Instructionals/Technical

  • Linux Basics: How To Check The State Of A Network Interface Card

  • Install PmWiki on an Ubuntu 14.04 VPS with Nginx

  • How To Dual Boot Windows 8.1 And Linux Mint

• Games

  • Victor Vran, An RPG From The Tropico Developers Will Come To Linux

    Victor Vran is a promising RPG in Early Access from the developers of the Tropico games. We have it confirmed from a developer that the game will be on Linux too.

  • A Good Snowman Is Hard To Build, A Charming Puzzler Releasing For Linux Soon

    A Good Snowman Is Hard To Build looks absolutely charming, and not just because of the name. It will see a day 1 Linux release, and it’s due out this month!

Desktop Environments/WMs

• Xfce 4.12, Raspberry Pi’s Whole Number & More…

  Speaking of Larry, back in December he helped quash a rumor that the popular Xfce desktop had been abandoned. Now we have further evidence that he wasn’t just talking through his hat — as if there was ever any doubt.

• GNOME Desktop/GTK

  • GNOME Shell Gets a Visual Refresh Based on the Redesigned GTK+ Theme In GNOME 3.16

    As we’ve reported in several GNOME related articles this week, the GNOME development team is hard at work to bring you the anticipated GNOME 3.16 desktop environment, due for release on March 25, 2015. As expected, GNOME Shell will be part of this release and it is the most important component, providing the actual user interface.

  • GNOME 3.15.90

    This is the first beta release of the 3.15 development…

Distributions

• New Releases

  • Download ClearOS Community 6.6.0 With YouTube School ID Support

    ClearFoundation had the pleasure of announcing the other day, February 19, 2015, the immediate availability for download of the final and stable release of its ClearOS Community 6.6.0 computer operating system based on Red Hat Enterprise Linux. The new version introduces a number of attractive features and new apps, as detailed below.

• Ballnux/SUSE

  • SuSE enters the realm of storage in a big way

    On the heels of SuSE announcing their new storage solution, Jack Wallen offers you reasons why enterprise customers should take notice.

  • SUSE bring their own Open Source storage solution

    SUSE, one of the largest open source company, have finally released their own Storage solution for enterprise customers. It’s a software-based solution powered by the Firefly version of the Ceph open source project.

• Red Hat Family

  • CentOS 7 Text mode installer

    I have 2 usb ports on the front of my Dell 1950 server, as the internal cd-rom drive on it doesn’t work, I’m having to use an external one, that leaves the other port for the keyboard. That means that unless I have a really long cable and reach round to the back of the server, which let me tell you is a pain in the ass, I have to use the mouse in the front usb port.

  • Fedora

    • Exciting GNOME Changes For Fedora 22 Workstation Pushed This Week

      Matthias Clasen at Red Hat has landed some of the exciting Fedora 22 Workstation improvements this week that relate to the GNOME Shell environment.

    • Changes in the f22 workstation

• Debian Family

  • Performance improvement for ‘cme check dpkg’

  • Derivatives

    • Canonical/Ubuntu

      • Official Ubuntu Phone Porting Guide Published

        Canonical has finally released the online Ubuntu Phone porting guide that should enable developers to get the Ubuntu Touch running on more devices out there that can easily support it.

      • How to Create QR Codes In Ubuntu/Linux Mint

      • Ubuntu 14.04.2 LTS released

      • Canonical teams up with Amazon and Microsoft to push Ubuntu for IoT

        The two companies are to publish their IoT developer APIs on Ubuntu Core so they can be used by Snappy developers in services and apps. The aim is to avoid a market fragmentation, and the new partnerships lay the groundwork to help Ubuntu Core’s development deeper into the IoT.

Devices/Embedded

• pcDuino3B hacker SBC features WiFi, GbE, and Arduino I/O

  LinkSprite launched a gig-Ethernet version of its PCDuino3 SBC, featuring the same dual-core Allwinner A20 SoC, plus SATA, WiFi, and Arduino compatible I/O.

  Like Hardkernel’s Odroid project and a few others, LinkSprite’s pcDuino community has been churning out ARM hacker boards over the last year with generally lower prices and improved features. The newly shipping pcDuino3B barely qualifies for the above description, but it should please pcDuino fans looking for a faster Ethernet connection.

• Phones

  • Tizen

    • [Video] Samsung Launch 2015 Tizen Smart TV in Africa

      Samsung Electronics has introduced several of its products to the African market at the sixth annual Africa Forum in Antalya, Turkey which is a three-day forum. The main Interest for us here at Tizen Experts is the Samsung SUHD TVs that is being showcased there, as from 2015 onwards all Samsung TVs will run Tizen which is a HTML5 web standards open source platform.

  • Android

    • US judge dismisses antitrust case against Google over Android apps

      The two consumers who filed the suit failed to show that Google’s allegedly illegal restrictive contracts on manufacturers of Android devices resulted in higher prices on phones, U.S. District Judge Beth Labson Freeman said in a Feb. 20 ruling.

    • Google wins dismissal of U.S. lawsuit over Android app limits

      A federal judge on Friday dismissed a lawsuit accusing Google Inc of harming smartphone buyers by forcing handset makers that use its Android operating system to make the search engine company’s own applications the default option.

      Consumers claimed that Google required companies such as Samsung Electronics Co to favor Google apps such as YouTube on Android-powered phones, and restrict rival apps such as Microsoft Corp’s Bing.

      They said this illegally drove smartphone prices higher because rivals could not compete for the “prime screen real estate” that Google’s apps enjoyed.

    • Android Circuit: Sabotaging The Galaxy S6 Story, Xiaomi Defeats Samsung, Sony Abandons Android

      Taking a look back at the week’s news across the Android world, this week’s Android Circuit highlights a number of stories including Samsung’s battery issues and the potential of wireless charging, the story J.K. Shin could tell the press at MWC, Sony abandons Android and its Xperia smartphones, Microsoft invests in Cyanogen, Xiaomi overtakes Samsung, designing for the South Korean company, Pebble picks up Android Wear support, and LoopPay’s Galaxy potential for payments.

    • Top Android news of the week: New trojan, DIY repair site, and Windows app does Android

    • Android malware hijacks power button, empties wallet while you sleep

      Don’t panic, though. So far the outbreak in small and localized: around 10,000 cases have cropped up almost exclusively in China, none of which work on Android 5.0. But code spreads so fast these days and something so useful is bound to be popping in malicious apps from dodgy online stores in the near future.

    • Android Malware Can Spy on You Even After Your Phone Is ‘Shut Off’

      The good news is that this creepy spyware isn’t something that has been, or probably ever will be, found in Google Play apps. Android has gone to great lengths to clamp down on fraudulent and malicious apps in its market, now scanning them both before and after you’ve installed them to your Galaxy, HTC One, Moto X, or whatever. So if you stick with the official Google app store, you should be safe from any of the above scariness.

    • Toggle Android 5.0 device settings with your voice

      Forget third-party widgets, Google’s Search app will now let you use your voice to toggle several settings on Android Lollipop devices.

    • New update for Register Android app

      Android users, update (or download) the Des Moines Register app for a new, improved reading experience.

    • WhatsApp starts rolling out voice calling feature to Android users

      After testing the feature with select users, it appears mobile messaging service WhatsApp is now rolling out the much awaited internet calling functionality to a wider set of people.

    • New BlackBerry Phones Can Now Run Android Apps from Amazon

      Launched on Thursday, BlackBerry 10 OS 10.3.1 provides the usual access to the BlackBerry World app store but also adds entry to the Amazon Appstore, where users can download a variety of Android apps. The latest update has started to roll out for several BlackBerry 10 devices, including the Passport, Z30, Z3, Z10, Q10 and Q5, along with the Porsche Design P’9983 and P’9982 smartphones.

    • Why Amazon’s Fire TV beats the Apple TV

      set top box has been around for quite a while now, but it has never been as much of a priority for Apple as the iPhone, iPad or even Macs. Apple long regarded it as a hobby, and that attitude might have finally caught up with Apple TV. A prominent Apple blog has come out in favor of as a better option than the Apple TV. Yes, a writer at a well known Apple blog has actually opted for the Fire TV instead of the Apple TV.

Confessions of a Recovering Proprietary Programmer, Part XIV

Similarly, if a patch fixes a difficult and elusive bug, the maintainer might be willing to apply the patch by hand, fix build errors and warnings, fix a few bugs in the patch itself, run a full set of tests, fix and style problems, and even accept the risk that the bug might have unexpected side effects, some of which might result in some sleepless nights. This in fact is one of the reasons for the common advice given to open-source newbies: start by fixing bugs.

Creating a Community: Getting Started

It was a little over four years that I was bitten by the bug for the Enlightenment desktop. It was fast, it was customizable, it was beautiful, but one thing it was not was easily accessible. There were countless directions on the internet of how to manually compile the latest version of the desktop from source repositories, but not only was this process complex – it was tedious.

Facebook Releases New Open Source Android Debugging Tool

SD Times GitHub Project of the Week: Stetho

Events

• SCALE 13x, Day 1: Oh, the Humanity!

  Attendance for SCALE looks like it may break previous records. Steve Bibayoff, who works the Free Software Foundation booth, asked me Friday evening if his badge number was any indication of how many people have registered so far.

Web Browsers

• Mozilla

  • Rust 1.0 Alpha 2 Lands All Major API Changes

    The second alpha release of the forthcoming Rust 1.0 is now available and it marks the landing of all major API revisions for this programming language’s major milestone.

  • Announcing Rust 1.0.0.alpha.2

    We’ve managed to land almost all of the features previously expected for this cycle. The big headline here is that all major API revisions are finished: path and IO reform have landed. At this point, all modules shipping for 1.0 are in what we expect to be their final form, modulo minor tweaks during the alpha2 cycle. See the previous post for more details.

Oracle/Java/LibreOffice

• LibreOffice 4.3.6 Released as TDF Celebrates Three Years

  The Document Foundation today announced the release of LibreOffice 3.4.6, the latest update for the conservative user and supported deployments. This release brings over 100 bug and security fixes as the foundation celebrates three years. TDF released a video as “a testimonial of the activity of many members of the LibreOffice community.”

Project Releases

• RcppAPT 0.0.1

  Over the last few days I put together a new package RcppAPT which interfaces the C++ library behind the awesome apt, apt-get, apt-cache, … commands and their GUI-based brethren.

Openness/Sharing

• A video game hall of fame, girls developing games, and more

Science

• How the Photocopier Changed the Way We Worked—and Played

  Recently I visited Whisk, a Manhattan store that sells kitchen goods, and next to the cash register was a strange, newfangled device: a 3-D printer. The store bought the device—which creates objects by carefully and slowly extruding layers of hot plastic—to print cookie cutters. Any shape you can think of, it can produce from a digital blueprint. There was a cutter in the shape of a thunderbolt, a coat of arms, a racing car.

Security

• Maintaining vendor trust proves tough for Lenovo, Microsoft

  News roundup: Amid hidden add-ons, discontinued services and walled gardens, vendor trust proves elusive for several high-profile tech firms. Plus: Evidence ties North Korea to Sony Pictures hack; card brands boost cybersecurity; and cookies that last 8,000 years.

• Lenovo redeems itself with open source Superfish removal tool

  What do you do when you are facing scrutiny in the media? Damage control. You see it all the time with celebrities. A famous actor or musician does something wacky or stupid and ends up crying to Oprah, or going to rehab.

  If you are a respected computer manufacturer, what do you do to fix a tarnished image? Open source. Nothing makes computer nerds more giddy than hearing that software is open source and the source code is available to investigate. Today, Lenovo releases an official open source Superfish removal tool under the Mozilla Public License.

• Superfish – Man-in-the-Middle Adware

  Let’s say that you are looking for a watch and you visit Fred’s Fine Watches. Every time you want to look at a watch, someone grabs the key to the cabinet from Fred, uses a magic key creator to create a new key, opens the cabinet, grabs the watch from Fred, studies the watch, looks for “similar” watches, and jams advertising fliers for these other watches in your face – right in the middle of Fred’s Fine Watches! Even worse, they leave the key in the lock, raising the possibility that others could use it. Further, if you decide to buy a watch from Fred, they grab your credit card, read it, and then hand it to Fred.

  After leaving Fred’s Fine Watches you visit your bank. You stop by your doctor’s office. You visit the DMV for a drivers license renewal. And, since this article is written in February, you visit your accountant about taxes. Someone now has all this information. They claim they aren’t doing anything with it, but there is no particular reason to trust them.

Defence/Police/Secrecy/Aggression

• Obama’s Libya Debacle

  On March 17, 2011, the UN Security Council passed Resolution 1973, spearheaded by the administration of U.S. President Barack Obama, authorizing military intervention in Libya. The goal, Obama explained, was to save the lives of peaceful, pro-democracy protesters who found themselves the target of a crackdown by Libyan dictator Muammar al-Qaddafi. Not only did Qaddafi endanger the momentum of the nascent Arab Spring, which had recently swept away authoritarian regimes in Tunisia and Egypt, but he also was poised to commit a bloodbath in the Libyan city where the uprising had started, said the president. “We knew that if we waited one more day, Benghazi—a city nearly the size of Charlotte—could suffer a massacre that would have reverberated across the region and stained the conscience of the world,” Obama declared. Two days after the UN authorization, the United States and other NATO countries established a no-fly zone throughout Libya and started bombing Qaddafi’s forces. Seven months later, in October 2011, after an extended military campaign with sustained Western support, rebel forces conquered the country and shot Qaddafi dead.

• US drone strike kills three in southern Yemen: Witnesses

  Three people were killed Friday in a drone strike on southern Yemen, local residents say.

• Spreading Terror around the Globe by Selling Drones to “US Allies”

  As an example last October an airdrop of weapons that was purported to go to the Kurds in the besieged town of Kobani in Syria to fight the Islamic State forces ended up in the wrong hands. As recently as last month it was discovered and reported that the US was regularly air dropping arms and supplies to the waiting Islamic State on the ground below in Iraq. Obama’s huff and puff rhetoric about hunting down the Islamic State in Syria in reality is merely another effectively deceptive ploy to commit air strikes on Assad’s Syria that he couldn’t get away with the year before right after the false flag chemical weapons attack committed by US backed rebels (that were later renamed ISIS). So now both Israeli and US military air strikes are taking out infrastructure inside Syria that hurts the Syrian people, destroying oil refineries and food storage silos.

• Psssst! Wanna buy a lethal drone? US to export unmanned aircraft

  The Obama administration is opening the door for US military drone makers to sell their unmanned killing machines overseas.

  “The new export policy is part of a broader United States UAS [unmanned aircraft system] policy review which includes plans to work with other countries to shape international standards for the sale, transfer, and subsequent use of military UAS,” the State Department said in a statement.

• Second UK-based Israeli drone factory shut down by protesters

  Instro is owned by Israeli arms company Elbit Systems, who make drones that are used to kill Palestinian civilians in Gaza. Optical and camera systems like those made at the Instro factory are also supplied by Elbit for use in drones flown over Afghanistan, as well as in Israel’s apartheid wall.

• Those calling for a boycott of Israel are ignoring some painful truths

  This past weekend, 700 British artists had a letter published in the Guardian in which they called on others to boycott Israel until what they term the “colonial occupation” ends. As an Israeli politician who supports the creation of a Palestinian state, it has been a long time since I saw a letter so shallow and lacking in coherence.

• I Was Born in Israel Many Years before I Realized Israel Was Palestine

  I was born in Israel and it was many years before I realized that Israel was Palestine. I was relatively patriotic. I was looking forward to serving in the army and then I grasped that there was little truth in the Jewish historical narrative. I then gathered that I was living on someone else’s land. At the same time I discovered the saxophone. By the age of 30, I left Israel and never went back.

• The Front Page Rule

  When U.S. media and U.S. government officials ask, “who are the murderers,” the default answer is enemy soldiers.

• The World We’re Leaving Our Children

  Dick Cheney and George Bush have no regrets about war. No regrets about torture. They defend waterboarding, mock execution, and rectal feeding. Bush referred to the men and women who conducted this savagery as “patriots”. Commander-in-Chief Obama, with his Kill List, drones, incinerating civilians, inspiring even more hatred of the USA.

• Hollywood’s Service to Empire

  Many Americans would find it strange to think of their local Cineplex as propaganda sites. But more than six and a half decade ago, the notion of US movies as tools of propaganda was hardly debatable for right-wing McCarthyites determined to eliminate leftists from Hollywood. As US Court of Appeals Justice Bennett C. Clark explained in upholding the conviction of ten Hollywood screenwriters and directors who refused to “confess” current or past Communist Party membership in 1949, US motion pictures play “a critically important role” as “a potent medium of propaganda dissemination” (quoted in Ellen Schrecker, Many Are the Crimes: McCarthyism in America [Boston, 1998], 328).

• A solo flight for the star of ‘Grounded’

  When she took a look at the script for George Brant’s “Grounded,” a one-woman play about an Air Force fighter pilot coping with the changing landscape of 21st-century warfare, actress Celeste Oliva wasn’t sure it was for her. But director Lee Mikeska Gardner was insistent.

• Community Roundtable: War authorization vital?

  Military action works only if we target weapon caches and the actual terrorists who commit these atrocities. We also need to understand that killing ISIS members will not stop the fanatical ideology. Only until the people of those nations fully reject the fanatical and distorted version of Islam ISIS has manufactured to suit their violent agendas, military action will do very little to stop them.

• U.S. must end its immoral drone warfare: Guest commentary

  I have been a minister in the United Church of Christ for more than 40 years. My religious convictions have led to my activism in seeking a more just and peaceful world. Right now, that activism centers on American use of drone warfare as one of the greatest threats to global peace.

• Drone strike kills 8 rebels in E. Afghanistan

  At least eight Taliban rebels were killed in a United States-led drone strike in eastern Nangarhar province of Afghanistan on Wednesday, said officials.

• Could Obama’s Drone Sale Spread Robo-Warfare?

  President Barack Obama’s decision to sell missile-carrying drones like the Predator and Reaper to U.S. allies has raised questions over whether this marks another step in the evolution of robo-warfare, or is just a boon to U.S. military contractors already making them.

• Soon on sale in your country: US armed drones

  The US is to export armed drones to sell to its military allies around the world, a move that has been welcomed by the arms industry but provoked outrage among human rights campaigners.

• US to allow export of armed military drones

  The State Department said Tuesday the new policy would allow foreign governments that meet certain requirements — and pledge not to use the unmanned aircraft illegally — to buy the vehicles that have played a critical but controversial role in combating terrorism and are increasingly used for other purposes. Recipient countries would be required to sign end-use statements certifying that the drones would not be used for unlawful surveillance or force against domestic populations and would only be used in internationally sanctioned military operations, such as self-defense.

• 6 arrested at Beale Air Force Base protesting drone deaths

  Six people were arrested at Beale Air Force Base in protest of people killed by government drones.

  Protest organizers said six men and women were taken into custody during an Ash Wednesday service at the Beale gate.

  The participants are accused of trespassing onto federal land, and they were arrested by military police as they spread ashes memorializing those killed by U.S. drones overseas.

• 6 Arrested At Drone Protest Outside Of Beale AFB

  Six people were arrested at a Northern California air force base in protest of people killed by government drones.

  Protest organizers said six men and women were arrested during an Ash Wednesday service at the gate of Beale Air Force Base.

• 6 arrested at Beale AFB during drone protest

  Six people were arrested at a Northern California air force base in protest of people killed by government drones.

  Protest organizers said six men and women were arrested during an Ash Wednesday service at the gate of Beale Air Force Base.

• Yemen’s former leader flees to Aden

  Yemen’s former president Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi escaped weeks of house arrest by the Houthi militia at his official residence on Saturday and fled to his home town of Aden, sources close to him said.

• Former president of Yemen dons disguise and flees home as Houthi Shias take over country

  The former president of Yemen wore a disguise to escape from house arrest today to fly to his home town of Aden, an official has said.

  Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi fled his official residence in Yemeni capital Sanaa after weeks of house arrest by the Shia Houthi militia, who looted the property soon after his departure.

• Hotel suicide attack kills Somali minister, 11 others

• Washington’s Foolish Foreign Policy: American People Must Say No To More Wars

  American foreign policy is controlled by fools. What else can one conclude from the bipartisan demand that the U.S. intervene everywhere all the time, irrespective of consequence? No matter how disastrous the outcome, the War Lobby insists that the idea was sound. Any problems obviously result from execution, a matter of doing too little: too few troops engaged, too few foreigners killed, too few nations bombed, too few societies transformed, too few countries occupied, too few years involved, too few dollars spent.

• Islamic State: bring on the drones

  The challenge of jihadism in Iraq, Syria, Libya and elsewhere is reinforcing the United States’s embrace of “remote control” warfare.

  [...]

  American arms companies engaged in armed-drone development and production have often complained at the US government’s restrictions on their exports, which leaves competitors such as Israeli arms companies in a good place to benefit. That official policy may now be coming to an end.

• Obama to Congress: Rubber-Stamp My “Perpetual War”. “Blank Check to Use US Military Force in Perpetuity”

  As President Barack Obama presented his proposed Authorization for Use of Military Force (AUMF) to Congress, he declared, “I do not believe America’s interests are served by endless war, or by remaining on a perpetual war footing.” Yet Obama’s proposal asks Congress to rubber-stamp his endless war against anyone he wants, wherever he wants. Obama has launched 2,300 airstrikes in Iraq and Syria since August 8, 2014. In his six years as president, he has killed more people than died on 9/11 with drones and other forms of targeted killing in Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia – countries with which the United States is not at war.

• Obama’s Latest Hokum on Violent Extremism: Arar Retorts

  In his speech this week to his anti-extremism conclave in Washington, President Obama declared that “former extremists have the opportunity to speak out, speak the truth about terrorist groups, and oftentimes they can be powerful messengers in debunking these terrorist ideologies.”

• Islamophobia is just the latest in a history of US imperialism

  The shooting of three American Muslim students in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, this month has focused attention on anti-Muslim hatred in the US.

  There are strong reasons for thinking the suspect, Craig Stephen Hicks, was motivated by anti-Muslim animosity to murder Deah Barakat, 23, Yusor Abu-Salha, 21, and Razan Abu-Salha, 19. The FBI is now investigating the case as a possible hate crime, although initial reports stated the murder may have been about a dispute over parking.

• Afghan civilian deaths hit record high

  Insurgents, government forces and international troops all contribute to highest total in five years since records began

• Arab Spring left army in disarray, soldiers sympathetic to rebels – Yemeni minister

  Yemen is grabbing international attention – the government ousted, the president under house arrest and rebels in power. Will the country slide into Syria-style civil war? And with Al-Qaeda in Yemen growing stronger, who will be there to stop it? We ask a leading Yemeni politician, state minister, and former mayor of the capital, Sanaa, Ahmed Al-Kohlani on Sophie&Co.

• Groups slam Aquino, US troops for violation of Constitution in Mamasapano operations

  “From all indications, the special operation in Mamasapano, Magindanao is a U.S. operation from the start. Of course the Aquino government won’t admit that because if they do, they would inadvertently confirm the US direct intervention.” This is the conclusion Prof. Roland Simbulan of UP Manila shared with the media at Thursday’s press conference of Save the Nation: Aquino Resign Movement.

  Based on Simbulan’s study of what have been revealed by SAF survivors of the incident, the fact that it was a US operation, that it was illegal and the Aquino government and the US are trying to cover it up resulted in the high number of casualties.

• Senate may send questions to Aquino to wrap up inquiry on Mamasapano clash

Environment/Energy/Wildlife

• On Fox, A Train Spilling Oil Is An Argument For Keystone XL, But A Pipeline Spill Isn’t News

  After a massive oil tanker derailed in West Virginia, several members of Fox News claimed that the accident demonstrates the need to build the Keystone XL pipeline because it is supposedly “safer” to transport oil by pipeline than by train. However, pipelines spill even more oil than trains, and when a major pipeline spill recently occurred near Keystone XL’s proposed route, Fox News barely mentioned the spill and didn’t once connect it to legitimate safety concerns about Keystone XL.

• Niagara on Ice: Falls Freeze Up Photos

  It may have felt too cold on Friday in much of the East to even think of walking outside. But since drones don’t feel cold, why not fly one over a mostly frozen Niagara Falls? That’s exactly what Canadian videographer Brent Foster did on Friday. The results were spectacular.

• Coming rain threatens to turn snow into ice, weighing down region

• Future of New York Could Be Wet, Hot and Flooded: Report

  New Yorkers like to complain about the weather, especially in the summer when it can get hot and muggy. Well, they ain’t seen nothing yet. A new report envisions a wet, overheated future for New York City, saying temperatures and sea levels will rise as climate change settles in over the coming decades. The report for 2015 released by the New York City Panel on Climate Change on Tuesday says average temperatures could increase by as much as 5.3 to 8.8 degrees by the 2080s — with sea levels rising a full 18 to 39 inches. At worst, seawaters could rise 6 feet by 2100, researchers project. “These changing climate hazards increase the risks for the people, economy, and infrastructure of New York City,” the report states. The city is also likely to see its annual rainfall increase about 5 to 13 percent by the 2080s. These changes could add up to flood damage beyond what was seen during Hurricane Sandy, affecting wide portions of Queens, Brooklyn, and the Bronx, according to the report.

PR/AstroTurf/Lobbying

• Wisconsin Introduces Word-for-Word ALEC Right to Work Bill

  Wisconsin Republicans have called a special session to take up a “right to work” measure attacking private sector unions–and the text of the bill, the Center for Media and Democracy has discovered, is taken word-for-word from American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) model legislation.

• Mainstream media’s rational irrationality

  One of the most deceptive and disturbing aspects of America’s political culture is the assumption that by having a free press and a democratic government, our country has erected a bulwark that restrains our leaders from committing the type of atrocities committed by our nation’s enemies.

• Bill O’Reilly Lies–but Some Lies Matter More Than Others

  Most prominently, Mother Jones’ David Corn (2/19/15) pointed out that despite O’Reilly’s claim (in his book The No-Spin Zone) that “I’ve reported on the ground in active war zones from El Salvador to the Falklands,” in reality he was never on the islands that Argentina and Britain fought a war over in 1982. Nevertheless, O’Reilly has repeatedly boasted of his exploits on the remote South Atlantic islands–telling a detailed anecdote in 2013, for example, of saving his injured photographer “in a war zone in Argentina, in the Falklands.”

Censorship

• Has free speech changed since the ‘Charlie Hebdo’ attack?

  “Charlie Hebdo,” a French satirical newspaper, was used to making headlines for its provocative cartoons – especially those featuring the prophet Mohammad. But that changed in January when two brothers stormed the newspaper and killed the publication’s editor and cartoonists.

Privacy

• Your SIM card is probably hacked by NSA and colonial cousin GCHQ

  In the latest leaks from The Intercept leaked documents show that the NSA and GCHQ used the previously talked about X-KEYSCORE program to stalk employees of SIM maker Gemalto. The agents managed to break in to the email and Facebook accounts of the employees to steal information secretly which they’d go on to use to collect encryption keys for the SIM cards.

• Green: Another update on the Truecrypt audit

  On his blog, Matthew Green gives an update on the plans to audit the TrueCrypt disk encryption tool. Green led an effort in 2013 to raise money for an audit of the TrueCrypt source code, which sort of ran aground when TrueCrypt abruptly shut down in May 2014.

• Another update on the Truecrypt audit

  There’s a story on Hacker News asking what the hell is going on with the Truecrypt audit. I think that’s a fair question, since we have been awfully quiet lately. To everyone who donated to the project, first accept my apologies for the slow pace. I want to promise you that we’re not spending your money on tropical vacations (as appealing as that would be). In this post I’d like to offer you some news, including an explanation of why this has moved slowly.

• Spy agency policies breached rights

  UK intelligence agencies’ policies on handling communications between lawyers and clients breached European human rights law, the government has said.

• Accused British hacker, wanted for crimes in US, won’t give up crypto keys

  An alleged British hacker who has criminal charges pending in three American federal districts is preparing to petition a Suffolk County, United Kingdom court to compel the National Crime Agency (NCA) to return his encrypted seized computers and storage devices.

  The BBC reported Friday that Lauri Love “will petition Bury St Edmunds magistrates for the return of his property,” adding that “the BBC understands that the NCA has been unable to decrypt some of the files and does not want to return the computers and media devices until Mr Love helps them to decrypt them.”

• US hacking case: NCA refuses to return Lauri Love’s computer

  Police in the UK, who arrested a man accused of hacking FBI computers in the US, are refusing to return his computer because they cannot decrypt its files.

  Lauri Love, 30, of Stradishall, Suffolk, who is accused of hacking offences in the US, was arrested in Britain in October 2013.

• ‘Citizenfour’ Will Receive The Ridenhour Documentary Film Prize

  Today The Ridenhour Prizes announced that Academy Award–nominated documentary CITIZENFOUR, directed by Laura Poitras, will receive the 2015 Documentary Film Prize. The Ridenhour Documentary Film Prize is conferred to films of exemplary merit to “encourage those who persevere in acts of truth-telling that protect the public interest, promote social justice, or illuminate a more just vision of society.”

  [...]

  “We’re honored to receive this award, which recognizes a legacy of whistleblowers and adversarial journalism,” said Laura Poitras. “This film and our NSA reporting would not have been possible without the work of the Free Software community that builds free tools to communicate privately. The prize money for the award will be given to the TAILS Free Software project.”

• US and UK Government SIM Card Hack Threat to Privacy, Infrastructure Security

  Yesterday, The Intercept reported that the US National Security Agency (NSA) and the British Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) collaborated to hack the network of the world’s largest SIM card manufacturer and obtained the encryption keys that protect the privacy of cell phone communications. The Center for Technology & Democracy (CDT) released the following statement in response:

• A close eye on security makes Canadians safer

  The four of us most certainly know the enormity of the responsibility of keeping Canada safe, something always front of mind for a prime minister. We have come together with 18 other Canadians who have served as Supreme Court of Canada justices, ministers of justice and of public safety, solicitors-general, members of the Security and Intelligence Review Committee and commissioners responsible for overseeing the RCMP and upholding privacy laws.

• Harper sees no need for more oversight of national-security agencies

  As four former prime ministers called for renewed efforts to enhance the oversight of national-security agencies, Prime Minister Stephen Harper said on Thursday that he prefers the status quo.

• At the centre of the anti-terror bill: Who’s watching our spies?

• Hack gave U.S. and British spies access to billions of phones: Intercept

  U.S. and British spies hacked into the world’s biggest maker of phone SIM cards, allowing them to potentially monitor the calls, texts and emails of billions of mobile users around the world, an investigative news website reported.

• Gemalto Starts Investigating The Degree Of Breach Allegedly Done By NSA, GCHQ

  Gemalto, the Dutch security firm, has opened an investigation looking into the claims that the company’s network was hacked, resulting in leakage of millions of communications worldwide.

• How Latest Snowden Leak Is Headache for White House

  Former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden has revealed so much information about government spying in the past two years that little seems shocking. But allegations in his latest leak, published by the Intercept, could upend any chance the White House has of mending relations with Silicon Valley in the near future.

• European Lawmakers Demand Answers on Phone Key Theft

  European officials are demanding answers and investigations into a joint U.S. and U.K. hack of the world’s largest manufacturer of mobile SIM cards, following a report published by The Intercept Thursday.

  The report, based on leaked documents provided by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden, revealed the U.S. spy agency and its British counterpart Government Communications Headquarters, GCHQ, hacked the Franco-Dutch digital security giant Gemalto in a sophisticated heist of encrypted cell-phone keys.

• ‘NSA, GCHQ-ransacked’ SIM maker Gemalto takes a $500m stock hit

  The world’s biggest SIM card manufacturer, Gemalto, revealed yesterday to have been hacked by the NSA and GCHQ, has taken a $470m hit in its stock price.

• Hellooo, NSA? The US State Department can’t kick hackers out of its networks – report

  Email servers still compromised after THREE months

• Jeb Bush backs brother’s NSA surveillance program ‘to keep us safe’

  Former Florida governor Jeb Bush delivered a full-throated defense of government surveillance programs on Wednesday, expressing a resounding faith in techniques pioneered by his brother, George W Bush, and staking out a position in sharp contrast with other prospective 2016 presidential candidates.

• Jeb Bush: NSA Bulk Telephone Records Collection ‘Hugely Important’

  Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, who is seriously considering a run for the White House in 2016, said Wednesday that the National Security Agency’s program that collects bulk telephone records was “hugely important,” throwing his support behind the practice as Congress debates whether to reauthorize or limit it.

• NSA Analysis Of Sony Hack Identifies North Korea [distraction tactics]

  The NSA backs FBI conclusion that North Korea was responsible for the damaging hack of Sony Pictures

• NSA chief says Sony attack traced to North Korea after software analysis [distraction tactics]

• Gemalto denies knowledge of GCHQ and NSA Sim card hack

  The world’s largest maker of Sim cards, Gemalto, says it cannot verify a report that it was hacked by UK and US spy agencies to steal encryption keys used to protect the privacy of mobile phone communications.

• The NSA is inside hard drive firmware – now what?

  It’s been almost five years since the discovery of Stuxnet disabused the world of its naivety about nation state malware but since then more attention has been paid to Edward Snowden’s NSA hacking revelations than the occasional technical insights into old-style spying software.

  Kaspersky Lab’s Equation group report, then, has been a bit of a body shaker while helpfully moving the story on a bit. We can now see that Stuxnet was, as everyone suspected, the business end of a far large platform containing eight or nine modules whose genesis goes back as far as 2001, the defining year for so many things that have been going on behind everyone’s backs.

• NSA & GCHQ teamed up to hack billions of SIM cards

  British and US securities services have hacked into the world’s biggest SIM-card maker and stolen billions of encryption keys, according to the latest leaks from whistleblower Edward Snowden.

• Gemalto opens investigation into SIM card hack by NSA, GCHQ

  Following a report yesterday that US and UK spies hacked Dutch security firm Gemalto to track mobile phone users across the globe, the company says it has opened an investigation into the claims.

  Allegations of the hack came from the latest documents leaked by former National Security Agency (NSA) contractor Edward Snowden and published by The Intercept yesterday.

  According to the documents, the UK’s surveillance agency GCHQ and the US’ NSA teamed up in 2010 and 2011 to penetrate Gemalto’s internal network and steal encryption keys that would allow the organisations to monitor mobile communications without the assistance of telecoms companies.

• Chip Maker to Investigate Claims of Hacking by N.S.A. and British Spy Agencies

  Gemalto, a French-Dutch digital security company, said on Friday that it was investigating a possible hacking by United States and British intelligence agencies that may have given them access to worldwide mobile phone communications.

• Gemalto launches probe after report claims NSA, GCHQ hacked its system to steal SIM card encryption keys

• GCHQ and NSA ‘hacked Dutch company’

  Britain’s electronic spying agency and the US National Security Agency stole codes from a Dutch company allowing them to eavesdrop on mobile phones, documents suggest.

• Rights groups criticise US and UK spies for ‘disturbing’ sim cards hack

  NSA and GCHQ told to stop pretending that law doesn’t apply to them after revelations that they gained access to Dutch manufacturer Gemalto’s encryption keys

• Encryption keys of mobile SIM cards powerful spying tool for NSA

  It would be another powerful tool in the arsenal of US and British spy services: the encryption keys for a large share of the SIM cards used for mobile phones.

  A report by the investigative news website The Intercept, citing leaked documents from former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden, said the US and British agencies “hacked into” the European manufacturer Gemalto to gain these keys.

• NSA refuse to comment on malware rumours

  Initially Kaspersky said it found personal computers in 30 countries infected with one or more of the spying programs. Naming the attacking group “The Equation Group”, it targeted Government and military institutions, telecommunication companies, banks, energy companies, nuclear researchers, media, and Islamic activists, Kaspersky said. However it declined to mention who the Equation Group was.

• Obama said everyone wants secure mobile communications. But the NSA worked to undermine that.

  Just a week ago, President Obama assured the public that he understood the importance of securing the privacy of mobile phone networks.

  “Ultimately, everybody — and certainly this is true for me and my family — we all want to know that if we’re using a smartphone for transactions, sending messages, having private conversations, that we don’t have a bunch of people compromising that process,” Obama told technology site re/code in an interview. “So there’s no scenario in which we don’t want really strong encryption.”

• NSA-linked Sqrrl eyes cyber security and lands $7M in funding

  Sqrrl, the big data startup whose founders used to work for the NSA, plans to announce Thursday that it is shifting its focus to cyber security with a new release of its enterprise service. The startup is also taking in a $7 million Series B investment round, bringing its total funding to $14.2 million, said Ely Kahn, a Sqrrl co-founder and vice president of business development.

• Sqrrl raises $7.1 million for its NSA-rooted security risk detection software

  There are numerous potential threats to Internet security: lone-wolf hackers, state-sponsored cyber attacks, or identity and data theft, for example. But one of the most difficult cybersecurity challenges to identify and prevent are the Edward Snowdens — the players already inside an organization who are looking to steal or share sensitive information.

• Sqrrl Adds $7M in Another Big-Data Analytics Deal for Boston

  In the second major big-data analytics deal in Boston in two days, Cambridge startup Sqrrl has raised $7 million in Series B funding. The deal comes a day after Cambridge analytics technology startup RapidMiner announced raising a Series B of its own, at $15 million.

• Is NSA ‘World’s most advanced threat actor’ revealed by Kaspersky?

  There is strong speculation that the so-called Equation Group – which infected the hard drive firmware of Seagate, Maxtor, Toshiba and others, and hit political and commercial targets in over 30 countries in the last 15 to 20 years – is America’s NSA.

• Latest NSA Revelation Presents a Major Risk to American Tech Companies

  The Week’s Washington correspondent Ryan Cooper rarely has a nice thing to say about the NSA, which is understandable because the NSA is an almost-categorically distrusted agency. If it were a baby, it’d be one of those really ugly babies that would cause people to say, “Darn, only a mother would love that.” Whether the NSA’s shrouded parentage actually approves of it is up for debate. What’s not up for debate is Cooper’s categorical dislike for the government’s surveillance goons.

• NSA-Linked Spyware Widespread, Impossible to Remove

  The NSA may be attacking foreign governments with a virus that can only be removed by putting a sledgehammer through the hard drive.

  The U.S. National Security Agency has created a trove of spyware that is difficult to detect and almost impossible to remove, cyber security experts warned Monday.

• GCHQ’s Hacking Of Gemalto Shows The Global Telecoms Industry Is Broken

  If privacy conscious folk aren’t already using encrypted mobile communications apps (I can personally vouch for WhatsApp or TextSecure for texts, and RedPhone or Signal for calls), they should be convinced to do so by the latest Edward Snowden revelations in The Intercept. They outline GCHQ’s “DAPINO GAMMA” attack on the world’s biggest provider of SIM cards, Gemalto , as well as widespread targeting of telecoms industry employees the world over. With the NSA, GCHQ has effectively destroyed any remaining shred of trust people had in use of everyday telecoms services.

• NSA could have full access to your cellphone

  It’s not just the National Security Agency that’s using hackers to do some scary snooping this time. The U.K.’s Government Communications Headquarters and the NSA worked together to hack Gemalto, a Dutch SIM card manufacturer.

  The story originally came from The Intercept, a site that publishes NSA documents originally leaked by Edward Snowden.

• Creepy, Calculating and Controlling: All the Ways Big Brother Is Watching You

  None of us are perfect. All of us bend the rules occasionally. Even before the age of overcriminalization, when the most upstanding citizen could be counted on to break at least three laws a day without knowing it, most of us have knowingly flouted the law from time to time.

• All the Ways Big Brother Is Watching You

  Drones, which will begin to take to the skies en masse this year, will be the converging point for all of the weapons and technology already available to law enforcement agencies. This means drones that can listen in on your phone calls, see through the walls of your home, scan your biometrics, photograph you and track your movements, and even corral you with sophisticated weaponry.

Civil Rights

• Holder Rationalizes Obama’s War on Whistleblowers

  Attorney General Eric Holder delivered a luncheon speech on sentencing reform at the National Press Club on February 17. He then answered questions after his speech. One of the questions involved President Barack Obama and his administration’s unprecedented crackdown on leaks.

  “The Obama administration has prosecuted eight alleged whistleblowers under the Espionage Act, more than all previous presidential administrations combined. What justifies this more aggressive posture toward leakers?” a person attending the speech asked.

• The U.S. and International Law: Q&A with Binoy Kampmark

  It has been appalling. The result is that a particular type of incarcerated figure has come into being: the Guantanamo inmate, one who is neither guilty nor innocent, yet too ‘dangerous’ to release. The result is, effectively, indefinite detention. (The point is also to be found in other countries, for instance, Australia, whose domestic intelligence agency has used assessments to prevent unconvicted, uncharged detainees from being released.)

• Loretta Lynch Is Eric Holder 2.0—And The Senate Should Block Her

  If President Obama’s nominee for attorney general, Loretta Lynch, gets appointed, she will continue the practice of her predecessor by expanding presidential power and the federal government, ultimately threatening the liberty of American citizens and the stability of the nation. It is the Senate’s constitutional duty to make sure that doesn’t happen.

• Terrorism’s collateral damage

  He found himself sent for secondary inspection at American airports, where he was asked if he had ever received combat training. As America prepared to attack Afghanistan, he wrote a piece for an American newspaper about how scared his family were of the coming war.

• We’re Losing Our Democracy and All Our Freedoms

  Critics of President Obama’s proposed Authorization for Use of Military Force AUMF) against ISIS have been focused upon its deliberately obfuscatory and ambiguous language, which they rightly note would make it essentially a carte blanche from Congress allowing the president to go to war almost anywhere some would-be terrorist or terrorist copycat could be found who claims affinity with ISIS.

• Signer: Confronting political extremism through debate itself

  Today, our commonwealth and the country at large are being poisoned by a toxic brew of extremism, gridlock and cynicism about leadership itself. Congress is both historically unpopular and unproductive. President Barack Obama has been stymied in his quest to bring hope and unity to a country divided between red and blue. And here in Richmond, many leaders of both parties can barely speak to each other, let alone compromise, on issues ranging from Medicaid expansion to nonpartisan redistricting.

• Q and A: Lack of international communication path to terrorism

  As the White House prepares for a major summit discussing how the root causes of terrorism and violent extremism, the Daily Lobo talked with Nakhleh about why people become terrorists, and what governments and communities can do to deal with the problem.

  What are the main factors that contribute to a person turning into a terrorist?

Internet/Net Neutrality

• Hyping Mythical Internet Taxes, New York Times Legitimizes A Net Neutrality Study Long Debunked

  The Times blog cited research from the Progressive Policy Institute (PPI) to claim that implementing the stricter net neutrality rules proposed by FCC chairman Tom Wheeler to protect consumers from paid prioritization of Internet access would cost “$15 billion a year,” and the recently presented bipartisan legislation would lower the cost to $11 billion.

• Distributions
• Devices/Embedded

Linux-based desktops work despite Windows app prevalence

With so many devices already based on Linux — Android devices and Chromebooks, to name a few — it makes sense for some companies to consider virtual and cloud-hosted Linux desktops. Windows applications are a hurdle, however.

Desktop

• Desktop */Linux Trends In Canada

  Now that we’ve pretty well figured out that the huge “Unkown” thing in StatCounter‘s “desktop” OS category is closely related to Android/Linux, this graph makes sense. Some people in Canada are hooking up Android/Linux systems to big screens. GNU/Linux is growing pretty well, not explosively, but definitely breaking out of the ~1% doldrums. ChromeOS is on a plateau, probably because schools just buy once or twice per annum. It’s all good. The grand total? 2.6%. It’s not wonderful but a far sight better than a year ago and this time GNU/Linux seems to be going places steadily. We have product/salesmen/promoters doing the job, finally. The growth in share is small, but this is a measure of a considerable rate of change of shipments/units/migrations on top of a huge installed base of PCs.

• Why you should consider cloud-hosted Linux desktops

  With all the licensing troubles that can come with hosting Windows desktops in the cloud, some companies — and vendors — are looking to Linux operating systems instead.

  VMware plans to offer a Horizon View client for Linux, and Horizon DaaS, formerly Desktone, has had a hosted Linux option for years. Citrix is planning a similar strategy for XenDesktop and XenApp with Linux Virtual Apps and Desktops. These two big-name virtualization vendors putting attention on Linux shines a spotlight on the OS.

Server

• Docker Project Partners with Oceanic Society for Open-source-a-thon to Support Whale and Marine Wildlife Conservation

• Docker to host ‘Open-source-a-thon’ — proceeds will be used to adopt blue whale

  Every summer, I board a charter boat out of Captree State Park in New York to go fishing. Why do I do this? I love to fish and I cannot afford my own boat, so it is a great way to experience the Long Island nautical life for the afternoon (not to mention catch a tasty dinner). It is also a great way to have a technology-free day, leaving the smartphone at home and replacing it with a rod in my hand.

• War Of Words: Cisco, HP Trade Barbs Over HP Open-Source Network Switch Launch

• Facebook is aiming to overcome Cisco and Juniper with Open source Networking

  acebook recently released as an open source project its design for a networking device that it says will coordinates the actions of hundreds of thousands of servers in Facebook’s data centers.

• HP Targets Cisco and Facebook With New Line of Open-Source Networking Gear

  Hewlett-Packard said on Thursday that it would sell a new line of networking switches that are manufactured by a Taiwanese company and depend on Linux-based, open-source software from another company.

Kernel Space

• Demand for Linux developers on the rise

  The demand for Linux developers has jumped seven percent in comparison to last year, a study has shown.

  The 2014 Linux Jobs Report shows that hiring managers at tech-powered companies are focusing more attention on Linux talent, and that’s reverberating in the market, with stronger than average salary increases to those working with the OS.

  Dice and The Linux Foundation surveyed both hiring managers and Linux talent to gain a 360-degree view of the thriving jobs landscape, and here’s what they found.

• Intel Quark SoC x86 Platform Support For Linux 3.20/4.0?

  Ingo Molnar has asked Linus Torvalds to pull the x86 platform support for Intel Quark SoC systems for the Linux 3.20/4.0 kernel.

• Code Merged This Week For Linux 3.20/4.0 Is Just As Exciting As Last Week

  Last weekend I covered the changes so far for the next kernel release, which will be called either Linux 3.20 or Linux 4.0 depending upon Linus Torvalds’ end decision. This week more exciting code has landed.

• Why All Linux (Security) Bugs Aren’t Shallow

  Zemlin quoted the oft-repeated Linus’ law, which states that given enough eyes all bugs are shallow. That “law” essentially promises that many eyes provide a measure of quality and control and security to open source code. So if Linus’ law is true, Zemlin asked, why are damaging security issues being found now in open source code?

• Linux clockpocalypse in 2038 is looming and there’s no ‘serious plan’

  The year 2038 is still more than two decades away, but LWN.net editor and longtime Linux kernel chronicler Jon Corbet believes software developers should be thinking about that date now, particularly in the Linux world.

  Corbet raised the issue at his annual “Kernel Report” talk at the Linux Foundation Collaboration Summit in Santa Rosa, California this week. “Time to start worrying,” he said.

  The issue is similar to the dreaded Y2K bug, in that a longstanding deficiency in the way some computers record time values is due to wreak havoc in all manner of software, this time in 2038.

• Graphics Stack

  • It Could Be A While Before Seeing The Tamil GPU Driver Code

    While the Tamil driver is moving along for open-source ARM Mali T-Series graphics support, it could be a while before seeing the actual source code.

    Luc Verhaegen presented at FOSDEM a few weeks back about his work on Tamil, the Lima driver project’s work on supporting the newer ARM Mali T-Series GPUs found on various SoCs. While Luc showed off some demos and is working towards a Tamil Mesa driver, the code hasn’t yet been opened up.

Applications

• Calibre eBook Converter and Viewer Now Has Better ODT Format Support

  Calibre, an application that can be used to view, convert, and edit eBooks, has been upgraded and it has advanced to version 2.20. It comes with a quite a few new features and is now ready for download.

• Ubuntu Touch Could Get Tox, a P2P Ultra Secure Messaging App

  The Ubuntu Touch platform is about to received a new messaging client called Tox that aims to provide the most secure environment possible for its users.

• c, calcc and calccmd: Three small calculators

• Why I Want Text-File Preferences For Every Application I Use

  I recently started using a text editor called Vim. For the uninitiated, Vim is a lightweight text editor often used for writing code that it comes pre-loaded on some if not all remote servers. Since it’s designed to be used without a mouse, there are tons of keyboard shortcuts to learn. This part isn’t a huge deal—for now just know that Vim is a text editor, like Notepad or Sublime Text or Word. (And note that I am still pretty shitty at using it.)

• Instructionals/Technical

  • Block Basic Web Attacks with NginX

  • Nova metadata recorded in libvirt guest instance XML

  • Buffer Overflow: Overwriting the Return Value

  • How To Install Qterminal 0.6 On Arch Linux, Manjaro, Antergos And Other Arch Linux Derivative Systems

  • How To Install UberWriter 14.09.08 On Ubuntu 14.10, Ubuntu 14.04 And Derivative Systems

  • How To Install Kernel 3.16.7 CKT6 On Ubuntu 14.10, Ubuntu 14.04 And Derivative Systems

  • How To Install Kernel 3.14.33 On Ubuntu, Linux Mint, Elementary OS, Deepin And Other Ubuntu Derivative Systems

• Wine or Emulation

  • Wine 1.7.37 Adds UTF-7 Encoding, Interface Change Notifications

    Wine 1.7.37 was released today with various changes that have built up in the Wine community over the past two weeks.

  • Wine 1.7.37 Adds Multi-Channel Audio Support, Fixes 71 Bugs

    Wine 1.7.37 has just been released today, February 20, and it brings interface change notifications, support for the UTF-7 character encoding, various graphical fixes for themed controls, support for multi-channel audio, a new implementation of Wininet on top of the Win32 sockets, as well as several bugfixes.

  • The Wine Development Release 1.7.37 Is Now Available

• Games

  • Bleed, A Bullet Hell Platformer Now On Linux

    Bleed is an indie bullet hell shootem-up platformer by Bootdisk Revolution. Originally released in 2013, the developer had stated low hopes of a native port release, but the wait for that day is now over! After showing up silently in my library, I decided to finally check it out and am very pleased to play this game!

  • Strength Of The SWORD ULTIMATE, Fully Funded & Coming To Linux

    The game is a 3D, third-person, arcade-style, action-game that combines the tactical and skill-based combat of a Fighter with the progression, overwhelming odds, and awesome boss battles of an old-school Brawler!

  • Editorial: Linux Gaming Will Be Fine Even Without Steam Machines Succeeding

    Let’s get this straight, the Streaming feature of Steam and SteamOS is not the main aim of Steam Machines, but it is a complementary feature designed to help Windows gamers who can’t get their entire catalogue on SteamOS right away. I’ve seen some writers mention the Streaming feature as if that is what SteamOS was mainly designed for, but it’s the tip of the iceberg. It’s certainly a nice feature, but there’s a lot more to Steam Machines.

  • Bleed 2D Platformer Is Now Available on Steam for Linux

    Bleed is a new 2D action platformer developed and published by Ian Campbell on Steam for Linux. The developer has released a patch for the game and made it compatible with the Linux platform.

Desktop Environments/WMs

• Xfce 4.12 Should Be Released in One Week, at the End of February

  After several emails between Xfce developers and numerous delays, it appears that the highly anticipated Xfce 4.12 desktop environment will finally be released at the end of February 2015, in the last weekend, most probably on March 1, if nothing goes wrong.

• Xfce 4.12 Is Still Planned For Release In One Week

  Earlier this week we wrote about plans for Xfce 4.12 to finally be released and that it was being targeted for the end of February. Unlike failed Xfce 4.12 plans of the past few years, it looks like this release will actually pan out in one week’s time.

• GNOME Desktop/GTK

  • Using play/pause buttons in Chrome with GNOME 3

    I wrote a post last summer about preventing Chrome from stealing the media buttons (like play, pause, previous track and next track) from OS X. Now that I’m using Linux regularly and I fell in love with Google Play Music All Access, I found that GNOME was stealing the media keys from Chrome.

    The fix is quite simple. Press the SUPER key (Windows key or Mac Command key), type settings, and press enter. Click on Keyboard and then on the Shortcuts tab. You should now see something like this.

Distributions

• Reviews

  • Bodhi Linux 3.0.0 Released – Detailed Review and Installation Instructions

    Bodhi GNU/Linux is a Ubuntu-based distribution designed especially for Desktop computing and is best known for its elegant and lightweight nature. The Distribution philosophy is to provide a minimal base system that can be populated with the applications as per user’s choice. The base System only include those applications which are essentially required viz., ‘Etecad‘ File Manager, ‘Midori‘ web browser, ‘Terminology‘ terminal emulator, ePhoto and ePad. Apt or AppCenter can be used to download and install lightweight applications in one go.

• New Releases

  • LinHES 8.3 Finally Makes the Switch to Kodi, Includes MythTV 0.27.4

    Cecil Watson, the developer of the LinHES (formerly KnoppMyth) GNU/Linux Live operating system designed especially to be used as a home entertainment system, proudly announced the immediate availability for download of LinHES 8.3 (Lorne Malvo), a release that introduces a new Linux kernel, as well as updated Nvidia drivers and core components.

• Red Hat Family

  • Red Hat: Open Source ARM Platform Gets Closer to Prime Time

    Red Hat’s (RHT) investment in ARM hardware is heating up. This week, the company announced that more than 35 hardware and software companies have joined its ARM Partner Early Access Program, and that it expects its partners to begin delivering ARM software and drivers to the open source community starting now.

  • Fedora

    • New features in Fedora 22 Workstation.

      Matthias Clasen recently posted some updates on the Fedora development list about new features in Fedora 22 Workstation. As you may know, we’re getting ready to issue an Alpha, so it’s a great time to try out these changes.

• Debian Family

  • Derivatives

    • Canonical/Ubuntu

      • Ubuntu 14.04.2 LTS Arrives with Linux Kernel 3.16

        Canonical announced that Ubuntu 14.04.2 LTS (Trusty Tahr), the second point release for the latest LTS branch, has been released and is now available for download.

      • Locally Integrated Menus (LIM) Set As Default In Ubuntu 15.04 Vivid Vervet

        After getting an option to always show the menus as well as global menu (Appmenu) support for Java Swing applications, yet another menu-related change has landed in Ubuntu 15.04 Vivid Vervet: locally integrated menu (LIM) is now the default menu.

      • Wayland/Weston 1.7.0 Make It For Ubuntu 15.04

        While Canonical remains committed to Mir as the future display server technology for Ubuntu Linux both on the desktop and for mobile devices, the upcoming Ubuntu 15.04 release does have the latest Wayland/Weston 1.7 support too.

      • Flavours and Variants

        • Kubuntu 14.04 LTS Update Out

          The second update to our LTS release 14.04 is out now. This contains all the bug fixes added to 14.04 since its first release in April. Users of 14.04 can run the normal update procedure to get these bug fixes.

        • Kubuntu 14.04.2 LTS Officially Released, Users Can No Longer Upgrade to Plasma 5

          Kubuntu 14.04.2 LTS (Trusty Tahr), a Linux distribution based on Ubuntu that uses the KDE desktop environment, has been released and is now available for download.

        • Edubuntu 14.04.2 LTS Has Been Officially Released

          Along with the release of Ubuntu 14.04.2 LTS (Trusty Tahr) GNU/Linux computer operating system, as announced by Adam Conrad on behalf of Canonical, the Edubuntu team was also proud to announce earlier today, February 20, the immediate availability for download of Edubuntu 14.04.2 LTS, a release that includes new kernel and graphics stacks.

        • Elementary OS 0.3 Freya Beta 2 : Video Overview and Screenshot Tours

          Elementary OS 0.3 Freya Beta 2 has been released by Elementary OS Team, based on Ubuntu 14.04 LTS and featuring with pantheon desktop environment, it comes with various User Interface improvements, UEFI/SecureBoot support, better and more discoverable multitasking, updated 3rd party apps (including Geary, Simple Scan, Document Viewer & more), Updated development libraries (including Gtk 3.14), Security and Stability improvements, tons of stylesheet and icon changes and fixes along with other interesting changes as well as almost 600 bug fixes.

Devices/Embedded

• Raspberry Pi, oh my: From classrooms to the space station

  Well, this is starting to look sort of like “Jamie’s Mostly Raspberry Pi Stuff”, but that’s not intentional. There are just a lot of interesting things going on with the RPi at the moment, so that’s where I seem to be spending a lot of my time right now.

  The big news, of course, was the announcement and immediate availability of the Raspberry Pi 2 hardware two weeks ago. The new hardware needs updated software to really make the most of its capabilities, so there was also a new Raspbian and NOOBS release (1.3.12) made at the same time.

• GDB 7.9 released

  Release 7.9 of GDB, the GNU Debugger, is now available via anonymous FTP. GDB is a source-level debugger for Ada, C, C++, Objective-C, Pascal and many other languages. GDB can target (i.e., debug programs running on) more than a dozen different processor architectures, and GDB itself can run on most popular GNU/Linux, Unix and Microsoft Windows variants.

• Phones

  • Android

    • Is the Samsung Galaxy S6 about to become the coolest Android phone ever?

      Gauging what a smartphone is going to look like before its released is sort of like solving one of those toss-up puzzles on Wheel of Fortune – the answer gets clearer the longer you wait.

    • T-Mobile Galaxy S5 lands Lollipop to lead this week’s Android device update roundup

      The T-Mobile variant of the Galaxy S5 is the latest to jump on board the Lollipop train. It’s been refreshing to see Samsung’s flagship score the latest Android build so quickly in comparison to previous versions of Android, especially with a new Galaxy S6 just around the corner.

      However, there are other updates to consider. Each week we gather up all the major software updates for the biggest devices; phones and tablets on U.S. carriers (and unlocked phones, of course), wearables, and round them all up so you don’t miss a thing.

    • Android Studio v1.1 hits the stable channel

      During Google I/O 2013 we were first introduced to Android Studio, though it would be two years before it would leave beta. Android Studio 1.0 arrived last December, but Google is wasting no time in pushing the platform forward now that it is out of beta. With that in mind, Android Studio 1.1 is now hitting the stable channel after two months of cooking in the background.

    • Android malware fakes phone shutdown to steal your data

      The malware requires an Android device to be “rooted,” or modified to allow deep access to its software. That may eliminate a lot of Android owners who don’t modify their phones.

    • New Android malware makes your phone look like it’s off, and then spies on you

    • Our Favorite Android, iOS, and Windows Phone Apps of the Week

    • Android 5.1 Update: What to Expect

      The Android 5.0.2 Lollipop update and Android 5.0.1 Lollipop update no longer serve as the company’s most current version of its new operating system. That distinction belongs to Android 5.1 Lollipop, a mysterious new update that is currently available on select Android One smartphones. Today, we want to set the table and take a look at what we expect from Google, its Android 5.1 update and the Android 5.1 release.

    • YouTube is launching an Android app for children

      YouTube will release a new app designed for kids on Monday, the Google-owned video service has confirmed to The Verge. The app — called YouTube Kids — will reportedly offer original episodes of TV shows aimed at youngsters, in addition to videos from child-centric channels on YouTube, and will let parents set timers to stop their spawn from watching too long.

    • Android L 5.1 Release Date & Download: Update Coming to Motorola Devices After Nexus & HTC?

      Some devices have already been rumored to be running on Android 5.1 Lollipop, but when will it be issued to Motorola devices?

      At the start of February, Tech Radar said that owners of the second generation Motorola Moto G (2014) may receive the Lollipop update soon.

    • Android 5.1 Lollipop release date confirmed for HTC One M7 GPE, Nexus devices to follow soon

      Google’s forthcoming Android 5.1 Lollipop update returns to the spotlight, as a HTC official has confirmed its release date for March on a spate of devices including the HTC One M7 Google Play Edition (GPE).

Facebook benefits from formalising management of open source

Facebook is now contributing more to external open source projects and keeping closer tabs on its own open source efforts

Facebook Picking Up the Pace on Its Open-Source Code Journey

Bind Exploit Closed in Ubuntu 14.10

Canonical has announced that a Bind vulnerability has been found and fixed for Ubuntu 14.10, Ubuntu 14.04 LTS, Ubuntu 12.04 LTS operating systems.

Pivotal pivots to open source and Hortonworks

A few days ago Pivotal made three major announcements: the creation of a Big Data Product Suite, a partnership with Hortonworks and the launch of an ‘Open Data Platform’.

INTERVIEW: TIM O’REILLY

There are many memorable quotes attributed to Tim O’Reilly. Which isn’t surprising. He’s been talking for decades about open data, the internet and the direction technology is taking us. Like Arthur C Clarke, much of what he’s predicted, talked about and written has proven incredibly judicious. He popularised the ideas behind ‘Web 2.0’, as well as the incoming wave and impact of social media. He believes in an open government and that the internet will become a global brain of networks and things.

Enterprise Software Giants Live In An Open Source World

A decade ago now, I was recruited by ZDNet to launch a blog about open source software.

At the time, the concept was controversial. Proprietary giants like Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) and IBM (NYSE:IBM) argued that open source was insecure, that the business model would not work, that it would destroy the enterprise software space, that they couldn’t make money with it.

One decade on and it’s clear what has happened. Google’s (NASDAQ:GOOG) (NASDAQ:GOOGL) Android dominates the consumer space, and those who advocate proprietary models would claim it proves their point. Android OEMs don’t make money, while Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL), with its proprietary model, is making a fortune.

Pivotal Open Sources Their Big Data Suite

Untangling the intense politics behind Node.js

The news that broke at the Node Summit last week — that Joyent and others are proposing to create a Node.js Foundation — came as no surprise to anyone who has been watching the controversy around everyone’s favorite server-side JavaScript platform. It’s been clear for a while that Node.js has outgrown its roots and become an important structural tool for the software industry.

Node.js’s hosts at Joyent didn’t plan for this — the code had been an employee project rather than a strategic investment. While Node.js is an important part of Joyent’s operations, it’s not a key product for the company, which has certainly spent far more to host it than it has received in business value as a pioneer of container-based cloud deployment. Joyent deserves credit for acting responsibly and maintaining its commitment as steward, despite the intense interest — and fierce political intrigue — in which it found itself.

Node.js fork JXcore goes open source, aims for mobile developers

With all the noise surrounding the Io.js variant of Node.js, it’s easy to forget about another Node fork that’s been quietly percolating: JXcore. Last year it added multithreading (sort of) and the ability to turn Node apps into stand-alone executables — but at the cost of JXcore being a closed source project.

ONF launches open source community to bolster SDN software development

The Open Networking Foundation (ONF) has announced the launch of an open source software community and code repository aimed at consolidating and accelerating development efforts around software and solutions that take advantage of software defined networking.

Web Browsers

• Mozilla

  • Mozilla Firefox 36 Will Bring Support for HTTP/2

    This just got in: Mozilla Firefox 36.0 will bring support for the brand-new HTTP/2 protocol, according to the official release notes from the last Beta version of the web browser. HTTP/2 will enable a faster, more responsive, and more scalable Web.

SaaS/Big Data

• PLUMGrid Offers Virtual SDN Sandbox for Testing OpenStack Concepts

  There are lots of IT adminstrators out there wrestling with sticky issues as they pursue OpenStack deployments, and many of them say that they simply need to experiment with security and stabiity before rolling out mission-critical applications. Enterprises simply don’t want to trust a cloud platform and move apps and data to the cloud without having full platform confidence.

• Q&A: MapR Technologies’ Tomer Shiran on Hadoop, Myriad, Apache Drill, and Data Analytics

  Recently, MapR Technologies, focused on Hadoop and Big Data analytics, has been out with some interesting announcements that we covered. We wrote about Myriad, an open source project focused on consolidating big data with other workloads in the datacenter, in this post. And we covered the latest release of the MapR Distribution including Hadoop in this post.

Oracle/Java/LibreOffice

• LibreOffice 4.3.6 “Still” Is Out with 110 Fixes

  The Document Foundation announced the release of LibreOffice 4.3.6, which is a new maintenance version in this branch of the famous office suite.

• Creating Forms for Easy LibreOffice Database Entry on Linux

  The LibreOffice suite of tools includes a very powerful database application ─ one that happens to be incredibly user-friendly. These databases can be managed/edited by any user and data can be entered by anyone using a LibreOffice-generated form. These forms are very simple to create and can be attached to existing databases or you can create both a database and a form in one fell swoop.

Business

• Pentaho’s Open Source Background Keeps It Flexible in a Changing Marketplace

  Enabling customers to ride the waves of tech trends is a big part of Pentaho Corporation’s business approach, said the tech company’s Vice President of Product and Solutions Marketing, Donna Prlich, during a live interview on theCUBE. With a new technology emerging every day, Prlich explained, it’s essential for customers to be flexible without sacrificing their ability to “get value from Big Data.”

FSF/FSFE/GNU/SFLC

• GDB 7.9 Brings Improvements To The Python Scripting API

  Today’s release of GDB 7.9 brings many improvements to the Python scripting API, compilation and injection of source code into the inferior with GCC 5.0+, resume improvements, hardware watchpoint support on GNU Hurd x86, MIPS SDE target, and a number of new commands.

• Tell Lenovo: respect user freedom and prevent future Superfishes

  Security experts have discovered a highly threatening vulnerability in software preinstalled on some Windows computers manufactured by Lenovo through January 2015. Extreme negligence on the part of Lenovo and unscrupulous programming by its adware partner Superfish seem to have caused the vulnerability.

Public Services/Government

• Visegrad countries and Bulgaria compare eGovernment practices

  Best practices in the implementation of eGovernment services by public administrations in Bulgaria will be compared with those in the Visegrad countries – the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia, at a workshop in Sofia on 26 February. According to a press announcement, Bulgaria’s coalition government is making the modernisation and increase of eGovernment services one of its priorities.

Openness/Sharing

• This electrical engineer built an open-source headlamp for doctors in developing countries

  That’s what Amanda DelCore learned through the work of Dr. Laura Stachel, who designed a portable light kit when she saw that doctors and nurses in developing countries had to postpone treatment when their lights would go out. The doctors and nurses were especially excited about the headlamps included in Stachel’s kit because they were hands-free.

• What do off-patent GM soybeans say about possibilities of open source biotech?

  March of 2015 marks the beginning of a new era in genetically modified foods. It’s the first year farmers can plant a generic version of glyphosate-resistant soybeans—the first GMO to be patented by Monsanto in 1996. There are some caveats to this, but it’s also a case that no longer fits the anti-GMO meme denouncing large agribusiness for holding intellectual property rights over seeds.

• Open Data

  • The open data platform, like United Linux before it, will fail

    ODP, much like UnitedLinux before it, is an effort by the also-ran vendors in a market to prop themselves up against more successful competitors. It’s bad strategy, and bad for Hadoop. Fortunately, like United Linux, ODP will fail.

Programming

• PHP 5.6.6 Patches for GHOST Vulnerability

  The so-called GHOST (glibc gethostbyname buffer overflow) vulnerability that was first disclosed in January isn’t just about glibc apparently. On February 19, PHP developers released PHP 5.6.6 providing a mitigation for CVE-2015-0235 – aka – GHOST.

• PHP version 5.4.38, 5.5.22 and 5.6.6

• Announcing a Specification for Hack

  Today we are excited to announce the availability of the initial specification for the Hack programming language.

Sources: Marissa Mayer is firing people at Yahoo (YHOO)

Adobe Photoshop: changing your perception of reality for 25 years

On the 25th anniversary of the launch of Adobe Photoshop, Sophie Curtis examines why the software program has become a cultural phenomenon

Metrolink delays after ANOTHER driver ends up on tram tracks on new Manchester Aiport line

Since November 25, at least 12 drivers have ended up on the tram tracks – half of those on the new Manchester Airport line.

Security

• Friday’s security updates

Defence/Police/Secrecy/Aggression

• Top 10 Bogus ISIS Stories

  ISIS’s violent bona fides are not in doubt to anyone paying attention. They’ve targeted religious minorities, beheaded aid workers, sold women into sex slavery and have been all-around devastating for those under their rule. But as America debates the possibility of a full-scale ground invasion of ISIS-controlled territory, it’s important to note that much of the ISIS threat — namely that which targets the West — has been habitually overstated by an uncritical media.

• Veteran War Reporters: O’Reilly’s Falklands Fibs Violate “Journalism 101″

  Revelations that Bill O’Reilly may have misled viewers about his reporting from the Falklands War back in 1982 are drawing fire from veteran war correspondents who contend apparent embellishments like O’Reilly’s hurt the credibility of all combat journalists.

• How Fox News Responded To Bill O’Reilly’s Falklands Fibs

  Fox News has gone to war with Mother Jones after the liberal magazine published a story raising questions about the credibility of host Bill O’Reilly’s past statements about his experience as a war correspondent.

• Who Killed the Argentine Prosecutor? More Than 400,000 March for Justice in Buenos Aires as Controversy Grows

  As many as 400,000 people marched through the pouring rain in the Argentine capital of Buenos Aires on Wednesday demanding an independent judiciary. The march came one month after the mysterious death of special prosecutor Alberto Nisman, who had accused Argentina’s president, Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, of helping to cover up Iran’s role in the deadly 1994 bombing of a Jewish community center that killed 85 people and injured hundreds in Buenos Aires. On January 18, Nisman was found dead in his apartment of a gunshot wound to the head. His body was discovered just a day before he was due to testify before lawmakers on his findings on the 1994 attack. Just four days before his death, Nisman appeared on television and outlined his allegations against the president and Foreign Minister Héctor Timerman. Investigators initially said Nisman’s death appeared to be a suicide, but no gunpowder residue was found on his hands. If it was not a suicide, who killed him? That question has gripped Argentina for the past month. We make sense of this unfolding story with Sebastian Rotella, senior reporter for the investigative news website ProPublica. He first covered the investigation into the 1994 bombing as a reporter for the Los Angeles Times based in Buenos Aires.

Environment/Energy/Wildlife

• CNRL’s Steve Laut Says Oilsands Face ‘Death Spiral’ If They Don’t Cut Costs

  As the world’s oil glut continues to build, wiping out hopes of a price recovery, the head of one of Canada’s largest oilsands operators is warning the industry faces a “death spiral” if it doesn’t figure out how to cut costs.

  Speaking before the Chamber of Commerce in Fort McMurray, Steve Laut, president of Canadian Natural Resources Ltd. (CNRL), said oilsands companies can still return to health, but only if they aggressively begin to cut costs.

  Costs have risen so far, so fast that oil producers were making three times as much profit in 2004, when oil was at $40 a barrel, than they were a few years ago when oil was at $100 a barrel, Laut said, as quoted at the Globe and Mail.

Privacy

• UK Surveillance: The Fightback Begins – Please Join

  It’s one of the longest, most-detailed stories that The Intercept has published so far, and is well-worth reading in its entirety. What it shows is that GCHQ and the NSA really do want access to everything, and that they are prepared to do more or less anything to get that. Put together with all the other Snowden revelations, plus the news from earlier this week about infected hard drive firmware – almost certainly another NSA project – and things might seem utterly desperate.

  And yet there are some glimmers of hope. A couple of weeks ago, the Investigatory Powers Tribunal (IPT), which reviews complaints about surveillance in the UK, decided that British intelligence services acted unlawfully in accessing millions of people’s personal communications collected by the NSA – the first time it has ever ruled against the intelligence and security services in its 15-year history. It’s true that the ruling was unsatisfactory in many ways, but it still sets an important precedent. And then just this week, the UK government was forced to make a humiliating admission that it was unlawful for intelligence agencies to have monitored privileged conversations between lawyers and their clients for the past five years.

• NSA’s Stealing Keys To Mobile Phone Encryption Shows Why Mandatory Backdoors To Encryption Is A Horrible Idea

  Over the last few months, ever since both Apple and Google announced plans to encrypt data on iOS and Android devices by default, there’s been a ridiculous amount of hand-wringing from the law enforcement community about requiring backdoors, golden keys and magic fairy dust that will allow law enforcement to decrypt the information on your phone… or children will die, even though they actually won’t.

  [...]

  It would be nice to see that the revelation of the NSA undermining one use of encryption led people to realize the stupidity of undermining other forms of encryption, but somehow, it seems likely that our law enforcement community won’t quite comprehend that message.