Links 21/01/2025: Mass Layoffs in "Security" at Microsoft (Despite Microsoft Promising It Would Improve After Many Megabreaches), Skype is Dead (Quietly)
Contents
- Leftovers
- Science
- Career/Education
- Hardware
- Health/Nutrition/Agriculture
- Proprietary/Artificial Intelligence (AI)
- Security
- Defence/Aggression
- Transparency/Investigative Reporting
- Environment
- AstroTurf/Lobbying/Politics
- Censorship/Free Speech
- Freedom of Information / Freedom of the Press
- Civil Rights/Policing
- Internet Policy/Net Neutrality
- Digital Restrictions (DRM) Monopolies/Monopsonies
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Leftovers
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Uğur Erdem Seyfi ☛ Just Write.
Whenever I face a problem that requires tough decision-making, I typically open a new entry in my diary and start typing whatever comes to mind. After flushing out whatever is in my mind at that moment, I then start organizing it. Sometimes, this process results in definitive answers to my questions, and sometimes, not. Either way, I still have a clear outline of the choices available and a better understanding of their potential benefits and costs.
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Wouter Groeneveld ☛ Fine, I'll Answer Your Blog Questions
Even though I don’t find these kinds of posts very interesting to read, I guess it can’t hurt to quickly raise up to the stupid blog questions challenge—Thanks, Joel. There is nothing shockingly new in here and most other articles about blogging might be of better use to you. Getting “nominated” to participate feels like being obliged to engage in those childhood chain letters. That’ll be seven years of bad luck for me if I don’t publish this!
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Robert Birming ☛ Bear Blog Question Challenge
I have blogged on and off in my native language, Swedish, for over 20 years. With this blog, I wanted to make an honest attempt to blog in English (which, as mentioned, is going so-so). I want to keep the blog alive, but I don’t dare hope for too much. Regardless, I will definitely continue blogging in one way or another. In my opinion, blogging is the optimal way to write. It’s creative and inspiring, while at the same time providing a healthy pressure to deliver something that is at least fairly readable.
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Lou Plummer ☛ When You'd Rather Be Somewhere Else
Lots of Americans are wishing they could spend the next four years anywhere but in the United States. Escapist fantasies are the order of the day. We know the old saw is true,"No matter where you go, there you are." There may not actually be a geographic cure for what ails us, but escapism and fantasy are what we have left. We are fully cognizant of the creeping oligarchy and fascist tendencies popping up all over the world, but we still want to get away.
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Joel Chrono ☛ Manga Recap 2024
I can count the manga I completed with only one hand, that’s quite sad, but I guess it makes sense. This year I finished a lot of manga above 100 chapters, and the previous year many series I finished were below 50 or 20 chapters in some cases, so it’s all a matter of perspective! Some of the manga I completed this year was really good! while others were kinda bad and all over the place. So, let’s start from the bottom.
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James G ☛ Designs from the last few months
I love opening a new HTML document and working on a design for something. I like re-designing pages on my website because this lets me practice my design skills while having content I can use for the page. Having content available helps because I can focus on the design.
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Nicholas Tietz-Sokolsky ☛ My writing process, and how I keep it sustainable
The very first piece of any blog post for me is an idea, some inspiration, something I want to share. These ideas come from a variety of places. Some of them are from conversations with friends or coworkers. Others come from problems I'm solving in my own code. Or they come from things I'm reading. Very rarely, they come from just thinking about things, but those are other sources with the connection hidden by the passage of time.
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Science
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The Conversation ☛ 2025-01-13 [Older] We’re getting closer to having practical quantum computers – here’s what they will be used for
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The Conversation ☛ 2025-01-15 [Older] How the science of tiny timescales could speed up computers and improve solar cell technology
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The Conversation ☛ 2025-01-17 [Older] Next generation computers: new wiring material could transform chip technology
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The Conversation ☛ 2025-01-17 [Older] How my Tamworth teammates and I were able to go toe-to-toe with Spurs – explained with science
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Science News ☛ Early human ancestors didn't regularly eat meat
The precise timing of that gastronomic shift is unclear. To get a better look at diets in the deep past, Lüdecke and her colleagues drilled samples out of the teeth of 43 roughly 3.5-million-year-old fossilized mammals from the Sterkfontein caves in South Africa, including seven different A. africanus individuals. Locked in the matrix of tooth enamel are tiny bits of nitrogen-bearing organic material, which reveal secrets about ancient diets, since the ratio of two forms of nitrogen is linked to the relative amount of meat eaten in life.
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Career/Education
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Josh Withers ☛ Only the Paranoid Survive | Withers Without You
I’m reminded of wisdom around complacency by a former employee of a formerly massive computer company whose lunch has been eaten by the current first and second biggest companies in the world by market cap. Former Intel CEO, chairman, and employee number three, Andy Grove, in his autobiography Only the Paranoid Survive wrote:
"Business success contains the seeds of its own destruction. Success breeds complacency. Complacency breeds failure. Only the paranoid survive."
This is the curse of the small business operator.
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Hardware
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Talospace ☛ Microwatt goes multiprocessor
It's been awhile since we dropped in on Microwatt, the OpenPOWER VHDL softcore. Microwatt now runs on multiple FPGA boards or can be run (slowly) in simulation, and is capable of booting Linux. Raptor uses Microwatt for the Arctic Tern soft BMC. Although it still doesn't support vector instructions, recent commits have added an FPU and many of the standard special-purpose registers, and the newest ones now add support for SMP.
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Health/Nutrition/Agriculture
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CBC ☛ 2025-01-16 [Older] Milka chocolate sold in Canada recalled for containing undeclared nuts
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CBC ☛ 2025-01-18 [Older] 'About half' of households in Jean Marie River, N.W.T. dealing with respiratory illness, chief says
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CBC ☛ 2025-01-17 [Older] Bank of Canada admits it could have been clearer on pandemic-era measures in internal review
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CBC ☛ 2025-01-17 [Older] He waited hours for an online order from Uber Eats. The restaurant doesn't exist
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Proprietary/Artificial Intelligence (AI)
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The Conversation ☛ 2025-01-16 [Older] Deepfakes of children: how the government can get to grips with them
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Microsoft Security Layoffs: What Does It Mean for Your UCaaS Solution?
Microsoft has announced a round of job cuts to its security division despite huge security failures in 2023
Tech titan Microsoft is welcoming in Q1 of 2025 by implementing new job cuts across a number of divisions in its business.Targeting employees across gaming, experience and devices, sales, and security, the news of job losses comes hot off another Microsoft announcement of separate and unrelated performance-related job cuts across its business.
Business Insider reported that a Microsoft spokesperson said the layoffs would affect a small number of employees without specifying exact numbers.
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Skype is Dead - Technology - Survive France
Skype has been killed off on or around 12th December for use by private users needing to call multiple countries, if they are not heavy users. Without announcement Microsoft has removed the ability to buy Skype credit.
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EDRI ☛ European Commission guidelines on the AI Act implementation must center human rights and justice
On 11 December 2024, the European Commission’s consultation on its Artificial Intelligence (AI) Act guidelines closed. These guidelines will determine how those creating and using AI systems can interpret rules on the types of systems in scope, and which systems should be explicitly prohibited.
Since the final AI Act presents various grave loopholes when it comes to the protection of fundamental rights, particularly in the areas of policing and migration, it is important the guidelines clarify that fundamental rights are the central guiding basis to enable meaningful AI Act enforcement.
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The New Stack ☛ More AI, More Problems for Software Developers in 2025
Generative AI has more code being created than ever. But despite the popularity of platform engineering, a developer crisis is brewing, as uncovered by Harness’s the State of Software Delivery 2025, which summed up the experience shared by 250 engineering leaders and 250 software developers.
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Nicolas Fränkel ☛ My first steps with Playwright
I searched for a long time but found no API access for the metrics above. I scraped the metrics manually every morning for a long time and finally decided to automate this tedious task. Here’s what I learned.
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PC World ☛ Microsoft starts forcing Windows 11's big 24H2 update on PCs
You’ll also have the option to postpone the update altogether, but only for a short time. (On my system, only a one-week delay is available.)
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The Register UK ☛ Microsoft to force Windows 11 24H2 on Home and Pro users
Microsoft has begun distributing Windows 11 24H2 to user devices as the company enters the next stage of the operating system's rollout.
Enterprises need not worry at this stage – devices managed by IT departments won't be updated. But users with an eligible machine running the Home or Pro version of Windows 11 will eventually get an automatic upgrade. A convenient time can be chosen, and the update can be postponed, but it will be installed at some point in the future.
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Tom's Hardware ☛ Microsoft auto-updates consumer PCs to Windows 11 24H2 — you can defer the update for five weeks
In a new blog post, Microsoft reports that it has reached a new phase in the gradual rollout of Windows 11 24H2. Compatible systems will be automatically updated to the latest release. Launched in October, Windows 11 24H2 has been plagued by a handful of jarring problems, including game-breaking bugs, persistent caches, and broken HDR. Recent patches have addressed most of these issues, and Microsoft is now confident enough to initiate automatic 24H2 updates for mainstream consumers. Note that this does not apply to managed systems.
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Stephen Hackett ☛ Project 8086 Part II: Real Mode Productivity; or, 8,086 Reasons to Get a Newer Computer — 512 Pixels
The pain points with this machine were all with the hardware: the terrible keyboard, the lack of mouse emulation, the fact that Windows is on here even though the V30 processor only supports Real Mode applications–all of those things are still true, and they make any attempt to do any “real” work that much more painful on this device.
And yet: it is a computer, and a computer is a tool, so surely this one has its place too, right?
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Cyble Inc ☛ Yubico 2FA Bypass Vulnerability Advisory For Linux & MacOS
Yubico’s pam-u2f software package, a Pluggable Authentication Module (PAM) used to integrate YubiKey and other FIDO-compliant devices with Linux and macOS systems, contains a vulnerability that can lead to a 2FA bypass in some configurations. This flaw primarily affects systems running versions of pam-u2f prior to 1.3.1, where the authentication process does not correctly handle certain errors. In particular, when the system experiences issues such as memory allocation errors or the absence of necessary files, the pam-u2f module may fail to trigger proper authentication checks.
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Digital Camera World ☛ TikTok wannabe Instagram has changed my square grid to a portrait one – is this the death knell for social-media-savvy photographers? | Digital Camera World
Instagram’s square profile grid is legendary. It’s been a hallmark of the social media platform ever since the decision was made to focus on image sharing and the name Instagram was adopted (it was originally called Burbn).
But now, after more than a decade, 1:1 grids are a thing of the past. If you’ve logged onto your Instagram account over the past day or two, you’ll likely have noticed that your profile has shifted from the classic 1:1 grid to 4:5 portrait-orientation rectangles.
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Security
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Integrity/Availability/Authenticity
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Kev Quirk ☛ How I Do Security Questions
Security questions like "what is your mother's maiden name?" are so fucking bad. Here's what I do to make them slightly more secure.
Whenever I get forced to add a "security" question to an online account, I immediately begin to rage. The reason being is that they add very little in terms of security, as the answers are often out there in the ether, thanks to our pervasive need to share too much on social media. Plus, unlike passwords, these answers are usually stored in plaintext. So any sausage with access to the database -- be it legitimate or malicious -- can see all your answers.
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University of Toronto ☛ Some ways to restrict who can log in via OpenSSH and how they authenticate
The simplest way is to globally restrict logins with AllowUsers, listing only specific accounts you want to be accessed over SSH. If there are too many such accounts or they change too often, you can switch to AllowGroups and allow only people in a specific group that you maintain, call it 'sshlogins'.
If you want to allow logins generally but restrict, say, password based authentication to only people that you expect, what you want is a Match block and setting AuthenticationMethods within it. You would set it up something like this: [...]
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Privacy/Surveillance
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EFF ☛ Police Use of Face Recognition Continues to Wrack Up Real-World Harms
Police have shown, time and time again, that they cannot be trusted with face recognition technology (FRT). It is too dangerous, invasive, and in the hands of law enforcement, a perpetual liability. EFF has long argued that face recognition, whether it is fully accurate or not, is too dangerous for police use, and such use ought to be banned.
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Digital Camera World ☛ I'm sure cameras glasses will never be a thing, and here's why | Digital Camera World
Camera glasses also get around the problem that if you observe something, you change it. This is an issue that street photographers have long wrestled with: if passers-by see a lens pointed at them, they'll immediately start behaving differently. Which is why, for example, legendary French photographer Henri Cartier-Bresson used a handkerchief to shield his camera and capture candid moments. Camera glasses give you an instant shortcut to that kind of subterfuge.
But here lies the great problem with camera glasses that the tech industry has yet to find a suitable answer for, or even acknowledge. We're talking, of course, about the creepy factor.
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The Register UK ☛ Improved Windows Search arrives... but only for Copilot+ PCs
Windows Search has been the punchline to many a Windows joke over the years. The service is intended to provide an easy way of finding content on a local machine, and has previously been mocked for being slow and unreliable. It was blamed for various failures, from causing high CPU usage and toppling over when bits of infrastructure had issues, to tripping up other applications, such as Outlook.
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VOA News ☛ VOA Mandarin: Leaked documents indicate broader Beijing efforts to collect information overseas
An official Chinese document obtained by VOA indicates that Beijing appears to be taking broader measures to screen and monitor overseas Chinese. [...]
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Dhole Moments ☛ Session Round 2
Last week, I wrote a blog post succinctly titled, Don’t Use Session. Two interesting things have happened since I published that blog: A few people expressed uncertainty about what I wrote about using Pollard’s rho to attack Session’s design (for which, I offered to write a proof of concept and report back with results), and Session wrote a blog claiming to rebut the claims made in that blog post.
Rather than make a messy edit of my previous blog post, I thought a follow-up would be warranted.
This is a little more tedious than my usual fare, so I’m going to start with the important parts (mainly concerning the proof-of-concept) and then get into the weeds of responding to Session’s statements.
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Defence/Aggression
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Deutsche Welle ☛ German TikTokers more approving of China, Russia – survey
Germans who get their news [sic] via the social media giant TikTok, especially those of a younger age, are more likely to hold sympathetic opinions of Russia and China, a poll has concluded.
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The Atlantic ☛ Republican Leaders Once Thought January 6 Was ‘Tragic’
Republicans used to denounce the violent insurrectionists of January 6. Their rhetoric is no longer operative.
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Nebraska Examiner ☛ Trump issues pardons for 1,500 defendants charged in Jan. 6 attack on U.S. Capitol
Former U.S. Capitol Police officer Harry Dunn said the pardons marked a “dark day in American history.”
“This decision is a betrayal to the officers who were severely injured — and died — as a result of the insurrection. This decision puts Americans at risk as these violent criminals return to their communities. These pardons are a reflection of what abuse of power looks like and what we the people are bound to witness over the next four years,” Dunn said in statement released by the anti-Trump group Courage for America.
The U.S. Department of Justice launched its largest-ever investigation following the attack that left over 140 police officers injured and upwards of $2.8 million in damage to the Capitol.
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Michigan News ☛ Trump issues sweeping pardon of 1,500 Jan. 6 defendants, including [insurrectionists] who attacked police
Among those set to be released from prison are defendants captured on camera committing violent attacks on law enforcement as lawmakers met to certify President Joe Biden’s 2020 election victory. Leaders of the Oath Keepers and Proud Boys extremist groups convicted of seditious conspiracy in the most serious cases brought by the Justice Department will also be freed from prison after having their sentences commuted.
Trump is directing the attorney general to seek the dismissal of about 450 pending Jan. 6 cases.
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Rolling Stone ☛ Everyone Who Was Supposed To Protect You From Donald Trump Failed
This is all happening because everyone — every one — who was supposed to protect the American people from this failed in the most miserable, unforgivable ways. It was a catastrophic top-to-bottom failure that many millions of people at home and abroad will be living with, now and long after Trump is no longer leader of a nominally free world.
Every institution you may have believed had value revealed itself to be for-sale or out-to-lunch.
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Wired ☛ RedNote Recruited US Influencers to Promote App Amid TikTok Ban Uncertainty
In a campaign brief obtained by WIRED, Solare Global, a New York City-based marketing agency, pitched creators on making sponsored posts for RedNote, featuring videos of themselves telling their followers about the Chinese app’s sudden rise in the US. The brief asked creators to describe “how fun and engaging the app is” and “emphasize its user-friendly design and international appeal.” It also instructed them to share their own RedNote accounts and encourage their followers to join them on the platform.
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[Repeat] The Strategist ☛ The TikTok boomerang
Beyond the issue of data privacy, US authorities also worry that TikTok might be used to influence public opinion in the US. But TikTok’s algorithms are closely monitored by Oracle, as part of a deal to address security concerns. In contrast, RedNote’s algorithms operate under the close scrutiny of the Chinese government, and the app is subject to China’s stringent content-moderation requirements, which could further shape the opinions of the TikTok refugees now flocking to the platform.
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Digital Camera World ☛ Sorry folks, TikTok isn't "unbanned", it's on reprieve – and VPNs don't work
Despite the whirlwind of the past 24 hours, TikTok has not actually been "unbanned" – and in the time it went dark, it became apparent that using a VPN would not make it accessible for American users.
This past Sunday, January 19, saw the official TikTok ban take place in the United States. Many American users who logged into their accounts were met with notices stating that, "A law banning TikTok has been enacted in the US. Unfortunately, that means you can't use TikTok for now."
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VOA News ☛ How TikTok grew from a fun app for teens into a potential national security threat
Starting in 2017, when the Chinese social video app merged with its competitor Musical.ly, TikTok has grown from a niche teen app into a global trendsetter. While, of course, also emerging as a potential national security threat, according to U.S. officials.
[...]
The Supreme Court on Friday unanimously upheld the federal law banning TikTok, and the popular short form video service went dark in the U.S. — just hours before the ban was set to begin.
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The Hindu ☛ TikTok ban: Why did India ban TikTok five years ago?
The Ministry of Electronics and IT (Meity) had said in statement cited that these apps were engaged in “activities which are prejudicial to sovereignty and integrity of India, defence of India, security of state and public order.”
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Hindustan Times ☛ Did Trump just admit that Elon Musk helped him rig US election? President-elect's ‘computer’ remark sparks wild theories
President-elect Donald Trump, who will be inaugurated shortly as the 47th President of the US, held a massive victory rally in Pennsylvania, where his one remark about billionaire Elon Musk has sparked wild conspiracy theories. U.S. President-elect Donald Trump greets Tesla CEO and X owner Elon Musk during a rally the day before Trump is scheduled to be inaugurated for a second term, in Washington, U.S., January 19, 2025.(REUTERS) U.S. President-elect Donald Trump greets Tesla CEO and X owner Elon Musk during a rally the day before Trump is scheduled to be inaugurated for a second term, in Washington, U.S., January 19, 2025.(REUTERS)
After welcoming Musk onstage on Sunday afternoon, Trump told boisterous crowd that the tech tycoon “knows computers better than anybody".
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Advance Local Media LLC ☛ Congresswoman suggests Trump admitted Musk rigged election in Pa.
The next couple of sentences … well, they are the ones that had folks talking.
“All those computers,” Trump continued. “Those vote counting computers. And we ended up winning Pennsylvania like in a landslide. So it was pretty good. It’s pretty good.”
Jasmine Crockett, a Democratic congresswoman from Texas, shared the clip from Trump’s speech and questioned just exactly the President-elect was getting at with the odd mention of Trump’s knowledge of vote counting computers.
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The Atlantic ☛ What Trump Did to Law Enforcement
Four years ago, scores of police officers were attacked only yards away from where Donald Trump will swear to defend the Constitution and faithfully execute the duties of his office. The scene, in the words of one officer, was “a non-stop barrage” with “weapons and things being thrown, and pepper spray, and you name it … You could hear them yelling. You could hear them, screams and moans, and everything else.” One officer later said that he was certain he would die the moment he entered the crowd: “You know, you’re getting pushed, kicked, you know, people are throwing metal bats at you and all that stuff. I was like, yeah, this is fucking it.”
All of this happened because Trump, according to Special Counsel Jack Smith’s report, could not accept his loss in the 2020 election, and so he tried on January 6, 2021, to “direct an angry mob to the United States Capitol to obstruct the congressional certification of the presidential election and then leverage [insurrectionists]’ violence to further delay it.” The crowd that attacked the Capitol, Smith wrote, “was filled with Mr. Trump’s supporters, as made clear by their Trump shirts, signs, and flags,” and they “violently attacked the law enforcement officers attempting to secure the building.”
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Rolling Stone ☛ Inside TikTok’s Influencer Party to Welcome Trump
TikTok sponsored an inauguration-eve bash for content creators, proving that the stigma around being MAGA on social media is gone
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Omicron Limited ☛ Report describes ways EU increasingly targeted by Russian sabotage
The report provides a detailed overview of the variety and intensity of attacks, which extend beyond cyberattacks and disinformation to include physical sabotage of critical infrastructure and political assassinations. Over the past three years, these operations have increased in both scale and intensity, employing ever more disruptive tactics. Their objective is to destabilize Europe and cut off Ukraine from crucial support.
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The Verge ☛ Donald Trump pulls US out of Paris climate agreement
Our planet’s climate has stayed relatively stable for the last 11,000 years or so, supporting the rise of agriculture and civilization as we know it, until the industrial revolution. The Paris agreement aims to keep global temperatures within roughly the same temperature range, preventing warming of more than 1.5 to 2 degrees Celsius.
It might not seem like a big difference in temperature, but climate change has already become severe enough to supercharge weather-related disasters across the US including wildfires still burning around Los Angeles that leveled entire communities this month.
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The Strategist ☛ EU, NATO forge closer ties with East Asia as Russia, China threaten
In the European Union, and in Poland in particular, we realise that in the current situation security is the most important part of state policy. Germany’s Ostpolitik engagement and Wandel durch Handel (change through trade) policies failed in the past. Policies that encouraged Russia ended with its invasion of Georgia in 2008, Crimea in 2014 and the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. This is why the Polish EU rotating presidency in the first half of 2025 will concentrate on security: military, energy, food, pharma and cyber. This is why Poland will spend a record 4.7 percent of GDP on defence (in real terms, the fifth-largest spender in NATO) and already has the third-biggest army among member states.
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US News And World Report ☛ Billionaires, Tech Titans, Presidents: A Guide to Who Stood Where at Trump's Inauguration
The crowded scene in the Capitol Rotunda on Inauguration Day featured four of the world’s five wealthiest men, five U.S. presidents, influential sporting figures and two other foreign leaders with prime seats on the dais
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US News And World Report ☛ 2025-01-17 [Older] Thirteen Dead in Clashes Between Police and Gangs in Brazilian Amazon City
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Transparency/Investigative Reporting
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The Atlantic ☛ The Tragedy of the Classified-Documents Case
The temptation might be to write this matter off as a lesser concern, akin to the byzantine case that branded Trump a felon in New York. Apologists have noted that other officials, including Joe Biden, also mishandled classified documents. Resist the siren call of these rationalizations. The documents that Trump mishandled were full of tightly controlled information that he stored on an insecure ballroom stage and in a spare water closet. Besides, the improper handling of classified documents was a key line of attack that Trump himself used against Hillary Clinton in 2016.
Moreover, the charges that Trump faced weren’t about taking the documents. They were about his alleged all-out effort to avoid a lawful subpoena and defy federal law-enforcement officials. He has now named some of his defense attorneys in the case to be top officials at the Justice Department that investigated him. If Americans hadn’t already gotten so used to this sort of thing over the past decade, it would be beyond belief.
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Environment
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Hamilton Nolan ☛ Lifeboat Capitalism
There are basically two ways that we can go on climate change. Either we will allow the rich to save themselves and abandon everyone else, or we will make rules to ensure that everyone receives fair consideration as disasters mount. In the absence of strong rules, the first option will happen by default. Not so much because the rich are monsters, but because human nature in our society is to save yourself and your own loved ones, and as disasters intensify, this tendency multiplied by an entire nation will manifest itself as rich people desperately bidding up the price of salvation until it is not affordable for anyone else. This is easy to understand. We have time to make better rules now. If we don’t bother to make better arrangements, to take government action to ensure that all lives are valued, nobody can say that we didn’t see the consequences coming.
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The Verge ☛ Trump signs executive order to reverse Biden’s electric vehicle policies
In loosening tailpipe emissions, Trump is essentially giving the green light to automakers to produce more polluting vehicles. And it wouldn’t be the first time either. During his first term, Trump directed the Environmental Protection Agency to weaken emissions standards that were put in place by the Obama administration.
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LabX Media Group ☛ PFAS Exposure and Health Effects
PFAS constitute a large group of synthetic chemicals resistant to oxidation and thermal degradation and exhibit water-repellent properties. These chemicals have been used widely in varied consumer products and industries, entering the environment and persisting as contaminants in water, air, and soil for a prolonged period. In this article, explore the world of PFAS, including their different types, applications, detection methods, human exposure risks, adverse health effects, and strategies to prevent contact to these chemicals.
"" ☛ https://www.theverge.com/2025/1/20/24347980/trump-ev-order-carbon-emission-rule | Source: The Verge
"" ☛ https://www.the-scientist.com/pfas-exposure-and-health-effects-72472 | Source: LabX Media Group
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Energy/Transportation
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CBC ☛ 2025-01-18 [Older] Coal firm suing Alberta government for billions argues minister's comments back up its claim
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CBC ☛ 2025-01-17 [Older] Alberta regulator lays charges against Imperial for failing to contain, report oilsands berm overflow
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CBC ☛ Trumps launch their own cryptocurrencies ahead of inauguration, setting off ethical alarms
Donald Trump had launched his own meme coin, $TRUMP, on Saturday, branded with imagery of his attempted assassination in July.
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Molly White ☛ No, Trump didn’t make $50 billion from his memecoin
Journalists’ flawed math and ignorance of crypto markets turn tokens into fake fortunes
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CleanTechnica ☛ Bitcoin Is Going to Be the Nail in Our Climate Coffin - CleanTechnica
I realize that this article is not going to be popular with everyone. Bitcoin is a kind of tech financial fantasy, whereby many tech fans have come to the conclusion that we can live in some kind of financial utopia divorced from inflation and economic woes if we follow this fake mining path. There are probably many CleanTechnica readers who are big bitcoin or who at least have significant bitcoin holdings.
Unfortunately, bitcoin is a really stupid idea that is massively energy intensive and could become the nail in our climate coffin. Naturally, it’s not one thing that is going to destroy a livable climate for humans (unless you want to say “burning fossil fuels,” which is by far the biggest factor). However, bitcoin — or cryptocurrency mining more generally — is a notable problem, and it basically just captures the essence of our broader problem as humans.
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India Times ☛ AI is changing the way people interact with cars
With Mercedes-Benz getting the nod for its cars to cruise at more than 90 kms per hour behind a leading vehicle in completely autonomous mode on German motorways, Katrin Lehmann, global chief information officer notes that this would not have been possible without the contribution of its Indian engineers in developing artificial intelligence (AI) technologies.
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The Telegraph UK ☛ How potholes are ruining cycling for Telegraph readers
Readers who have collided with potholes while cycling and were injured – and others who have narrowly escaped a similar fate – spoke to The Telegraph, and we contacted their councils to see how the problem was being addressed.
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AstroTurf/Lobbying/Politics
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Stanford University ☛ Assessing the Implementation of Federal AI Leadership and Compliance Mandates
We assess the implementation of requirements for agencies to (a) appoint Chief AI Officers (CAIOs) and (b) issue plans for internal strategic planning and governance (Compliance Plans), as well as (c) make associated budgetary requests. We examine implementation at 266 federal agencies, as well as subsets of agencies that are singled out in directives (e.g., the 24 Chief Financial Officers [CFO] Act agencies)5 and are large in size as designated by the Office of Personnel Management (i.e., 11 distinct non-CFO Act agencies with 1,000 or more employees).6 All the analysis presented in this paper is based on publicly available data as of October 20, 2024.
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Scoop News Group ☛ Stanford report: Despite federal AI progress, barriers to governance persist
The Friday report published by Stanford Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence and the Stanford Regulation, Evaluation, and Governance Lab is a review of agencies’ actions to comply with AI directives and primarily focuses on progress in designating agency chief AI officers, publishing compliance plans for their AI governance efforts, and requesting funding to support that work.
Researchers concluded that an “overwhelming reliance” on CAIOs that are “dual-hatted” (or have two positions at once) is a reflection of AI talent challenges within the government, focus on risk compliance and fast deadlines overshadow the “broader purpose of the CAIO role,” and variation in compliance “underscores the fragmented nature of AI innovation and governance.”
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Tom's Hardware ☛ New York proposes background checks for 3D printer purchases — the bill combats 3D-printed guns
New York State Senator Jennifer Rajkumar sponsored State Assembly Bill A02228, which requires anyone selling a 3D printer capable of “printing a firearm or any components of a firearm” to “request and receive criminal history information.” According to Gizmodo, this gives New York State 15 days to conduct the background check and determine whether the buyer can buy the printer. The senator proposed this law on January 15, which is still being considered at the committee level.
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India Times ☛ Facebook, X, YouTube to do more against online hate speech, EU says
Other firms that have agreed with the voluntary code set up in May 2016 are Dailymotion, Instagram, Jeuxvideo.com, LinkedIn, Microsoft hosted consumer services, Snapchat, Rakuten Viber, TikTok and Twitch. The DSA requires tech companies to do more to fight illegal and harmful content on their platforms.
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TMZ ☛ Elon Musk's Crowd Salute Draws Ugly Comparisons After Inauguration
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Hindustan Times ☛ Fans defend Elon Musk, say ‘he is not using the Nazi salute’ amid brewing controversy
Donald Trump was sworn in as the 47th president of the United States of America. During the event, Elon Musk was among the few who took the stage at Capitol One Arena to thank Republican supporters. During his speech, however, a gesture by the tech billionaire prompted instant controversy on social media. Many accused him of doing “Sieg Heil” while on stage.
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Ed Zitron ☛ The Rot Economy
Why did billions of dollars get pumped into [cryptocurrency]’s countless non-companies? Because “success” as defined by capital has been reframed to mean “number go up.” As a notion, it is divorced from any long-term thinking, fiscal probity, or even what you and I would call “morality.”
Why did these companies never seem to get blamed for hiring and then quickly firing tens of thousands of people? Because at the heart of the business media and the markets, workers were necessary casualties of the eternal struggle for growth. Layoffs are inevitably reported as a large number (“10,000 employees at Microsoft”), which makes it all too easy to remove the human element. When confronted with numbers of this scale, it’s easy to ignore the individual human agony that comes with losing a job. The uncertainty and shame that follows a firing.
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EDRI ☛ Meta and X are going rogue. Here is what Europe should do now.
With Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos and many other tech billionaires cuddling up to an ever more authoritarian Trump administration, it is crucial that the EU sticks to stringent enforcement of its tech laws. However, to solve the core problem,we have to curb the immense grip Big Tech has on our institutions and invest in truly independent digital alternatives.
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CoryDoctorow ☛ Pluralistic: Enshittification isn’t caused by venture capital
What changed? What caused Zuck to enshittify his service? And, even more importantly for those of us who care about the people locked into Facebook's walled gardens: what stopped him from enshittifying his services in the "good old days?"
At its root, enshittification is a theory about constraints. Companies pursue profit at all costs, but while you may be tempted to focus on the "at all costs" part of that formulation, you musn't neglect the "profits" part. Companies don't pursue unprofitable actions at all costs – they only pursue the plans that they judge are likely to yield profits.
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Misinformation/Disinformation/Propaganda
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The Guardian UK ☛ ‘That’s the one thing we did’: New Zealand irked by Trump’s false claim US split the atom
During his inaugural address on Monday, Donald Trump reeled off a list of US achievements, including a claim that its experts split the atom.
However, that honour belongs to revered physicist Sir Ernest Rutherford, a New Zealander who managed the historic feat in 1917 at Victoria University of Manchester in England. The element rutherfordium was named after him in 1997.
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Nebraska Examiner ☛ Facebook decision disrespects truth’s place in society
All of which made for intriguing timing when Nebraska’s 109th Legislature convened the same day Meta boss Mark Zuckerberg announced that his Facebook would no longer fact check posts. Rather, it will rely on “community notes,” where other online users can add context or call out horse hockey, a so-so strategy already employed on Twitter-now-X.
I could be reading this all wrong, but it seems Zuckerberg is saying that what is factual or true or trusted information in Facebook posts will now be determined by the same enormous pool of users, some of whom also post and pass on conspiracy theories, the rankest of rumors and a spectrum of lies: bald-faced, straight-up, damned, white, pathological, compulsive, out-and-out, of commission, of omission, paltering and everyone’s favorite: just making stuff up.
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US News And World Report ☛ Russian Disinformation Targets German Election Campaign, Says Think-Tank
German think-tank CeMAS said it had tracked down hundreds of German-language posts on social media platform X over the past month exhibiting what it said were typical patterns of Russia's Doppelgaenger disinformation campaign against the West that German, U.S. and French authorities have previously denounced.
The campaign, created after Russia's 2022 invasion of Ukraine to undermine Western support for Kyiv, spreads links to falsified Western news outlets sharing false information, according to a German foreign ministry report published last June.
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CNN ☛ Fact check: Trump makes false claims about his 2024 victory, the 2020 election, immigration and more at DC rally
The day before his second inauguration, President-elect Donald Trump held a campaign-style rally at an arena in Washington, where he repeated some of the most frequent false claims from the campaign trail while also sprinkling in some new falsehoods.
Here is a fact check of some of his claims.
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Censorship/Free Speech
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The Sun ☛ OnlyFans star Azranur AV, 23, ARRESTED for vowing to break Bonnie Blue’s sex challenge world record | The Sun
They launched an investigation into the controversial post before catching her at a hospital as she awaited a cosmetic surgery operation in Atasehir.
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Tech Central (South Africa) ☛ This was South Africa's first-ever television broadcast
South Africa’s first official television broadcast was aired 49 years ago, on 5 January 1976, many years behind the rest of the world and even trailing many African countries. Neighbouring Rhodesia – now Zimbabwe – got TV 15 years before South Africa.
The ultra-conservative National Party government saw television as a threat to its stranglehold on information, viewing the medium as a doorway for the English language to gain dominance over Afrikaans as the lingua franca of social and political discourse in the country.
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NDTV ☛ Iran Sentences Pop Singer To Death For "Insulting" Prophet Muhammed
An Iranian court has sentenced popular singer Amir Hossein Maghsoudloo, known as Tataloo, to death on appeal after he was convicted of blasphemy.
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EDRI ☛ Why EDRi is leaving X and where to find us
Since Musk’s acquisition of X in October 2022, we have been working towards an exit strategy. Recent developments and Musk becoming part of the second Trump administration have contributed to a unique and toxic platform power-grab, which has accelerated our X-it timeline. EDRi is joining many other organisations and people in leaving X by the end of January 2025. On 20 January, we will host an important X Spaces conversation to encourage our followers to join Mastodon.
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NDTV ☛ Iran Sentences Pop Singer To Death For "Insulting" Prophet Muhammed
It said "the case was reopened, and this time the defendant was sentenced to death for insulting the prophet", referring to Islam's Prophet Mohammed.
The report added that the verdict was not final and can still be appealed.
The 37-year-old underground musician had been living in Istanbul since 2018 before Turkish police handed him over to Iran in December 2023.
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Freedom of Information / Freedom of the Press
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ANF News ☛ Journalist Silêman Ehmed released from prison
Ehmed was arrested on 25 October 2023 by security forces of the ruling KDP (Kurdistan Democratic Party), who initially took him to an unknown location. For months, information about his condition and whereabouts was denied. Only in February last year did it become known that he was being held in an unofficial prison of the KDP-affiliated Asayish in Duhok.
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ANF News ☛ Six journalists remanded in custody
Journalists Necla Demir, Rahime Karvar, Ahmet Güneş, Welat Ekin, Vedat Örüç and Reyhan Hacıoğlu, who were detained in house raids on January 17 as part of an Istanbul-based investigation, were imprisoned on charges of “membership in an illegal organization”, referring to the PKK.
The court decision was grounded on the news articles and discussion programs of the journalists.
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Press Gazette ☛ Journalist Greg Hadfield faces charge after sharing Ivor Caplin post
A retired Brighton-based journalist has been summoned to appear in court after drawing attention to an obscene Twitter/X message posted by the account of former Labour MP Ivor Caplin. [...] Greg Hadfield says he is a whistleblower but now faces stigma of pornography-related criminal conviction.
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VOA News ☛ Journalists in Haiti demand justice, bury 2nd colleague killed by gangs
Natoux was fatally shot on Christmas Eve in one of the worst attacks on the press in the troubled Caribbean country, with gangs opening fire during what was supposed to be the reopening of Haiti's largest public hospital.
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Civil Rights/Policing
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TruthOut ☛ 2025-01-13 [Older] Amazon Quietly Rescinds Pledges to Protect Black and LGBTQ Rights
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Papers Please ☛ UK “Electronic Travel Authorization” sets a bad example
Effective January 8, 2025, the United Kingdom began requiring citizens of the USA and most other countries who previously could enter the UK without visas for short visits for tourism and some other purposes to obtain a so-called Electronic Travel Authorization (ETA) as a new precondition for admission to the UK for those purposes.
The UK ETA is significant both in its own right and as a case study in what’s wrong with similar requirements and systems already in effect in other countries, including the USA, Canada, Australia, and in preparation in many more countries including all members of the European Union.
The requirement for an ETA is intended for a pupose fundamentally contrary to international treaties on aviation and the rights of refugees, and has been implemented in ways that facilitate surveillance of ETA applicants and arbitrary control by a few private companies of who can and who can’t travel to the UK.
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University of Michigan ☛ Action is key to activism, MLK Symposium speaker says
The keynote speaker at the University of Michigan’s 2025 Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Symposium had a clear message for modern activists seeking to sustain King’s fight against systemic inequities.
“Get on with it. Don’t overthink it,” said Erika Alexander, actress, director, producer — and an activist herself. “And young activists, do you know what? Suck it up, man. Life is disappointing, but don’t get discouraged. And don’t stop just because you did one thing.”
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EDRI ☛ Pre-travel controls: Digitalising travel documents
It is our view that these proposals may disproportionately impact fundamental rights including to privacy, data protection, non-discrimination and freedom of movement.
This article highlights three aspects of the proposed regulation that could put people at risk:
• creating infrastructure for biometric mass surveillance
• prioritising commercial interests while constructing people as risky
• instituting new and reinforcing existing forms of discrimination
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Privacy International ☛ Time to deliver answers: An open letter to Just Eat Takeaway, Uber and Deliveroo
12 organisations across the EU and the UK are calling on food delivery platforms to respect their workforce, and improve the transparency and explainability around the algorithms they use.
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Privacy International ☛ TIME TO DELIVER ANSWERS: transparency and explainability for algorithmic decisions at work
What if your boss was an algorithm? What would you do if your employer suddenly fired you or reduced your pay without telling you why? And without so much as giving you a reason when you ask why this happened?
Unfortunately, this is the reality for the many millions of gig workers worldwide driving or delivering for platforms like Uber, Deliveroo, Wolt, Just Eat, etc.
One of the main reasons for this is their heavy reliance on algorithms to manage workers. From hiring to firing to dynamically adjusting pay to allocating job, these systems affect all aspects of platform work and produce decisions that could make or break a gig worker's livelihood. Yet, there is limited or no transparency with regards to how these decisions are reached and how those algorithms function, leaving workers at the mercy of unfair or discriminatory decisions, with little means to challenge or at least better understand them.
To challenge this state of play, Privacy International launched a campaign against the opaque deployment of these decision-making algorithms by gig economy platforms.
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Logikal Solutions ☛ Illegal Alien Raids Must Start at Elon Musk's Tesla
The dirty little secret of IT and Tech Companies is human trafficking. When President Obamma received a full court press from Tech Companies claiming a shortage of IT workers, he publicly stated the expansion of visas would expressly prohibit replacing U.S. workers with H1s. So much for that promise. California became the newest Jim Crow state only it was Indians instead of blacks. Oh, to be sure that was only the beginning. Cognizant isn’t the only Indian firm to systematically replace U.S. Citizens with low skilled low wage Indians. Collabera and their clients engage in it as well. You will be hard pressed to find any company listed in that graphic that isn’t wholesale replacing U.S. Citizens with H1 and other visa workers, even if the visa the person holds does not allow them to legally work in America.
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Marijke Luttekes ☛ You have two downsides: you are young, and you are a woman
Someone told me that my two downsides to acquiring freelance jobs are that I am young and a woman. Those words have been living rent-free in my head for months, and I need to get them off my chest.
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The Guardian UK ☛ Single mother entitled to same parental leave as couple, Spanish court rules
The woman, a part-time worker known by the initials SPM, gave birth to a daughter in the south-eastern region of Murcia in January 2022. SPM requested additional parental leave, arguing that her daughter was entitled to the same amount of parental care as any other newborn. After her request was turned down by social services and the courts, she appealed to the regional high court.
In a ruling last week, Murcia’s high court found in her favour and decided she was due a total of 32 weeks of parental leave and support: 16 weeks for her, and 16 additional weeks that would have been available to her partner were she to have had one.
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The Telegraph UK ☛ The battle to save Bangladesh’s child brides: ‘They marry off girls because they are a burden’
As researchers find that more than 60 per cent of Bangladeshi families practise child marriage, campaigners fight to keep girls in education
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Internet Policy/Net Neutrality
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Inside Towers ☛ Carriers Join the Fire Fight
Wildfire conditions and Public Safety Power Shutoffs in the Los Angeles area have caused service interruptions for some customers, according to Verizon (NYSE: VZ). The carrier posted yesterday that it is using a fleet of over 550 mobile assets, including drone and aerial technologies and nearly 300 satellite-based assets, to help cover connectivity issues when traditional infrastructures are compromised. Verizon said its engineers are working “quickly and safely,” coordinating with local public agencies to coordinate support and mitigate impacts for those customers affected across the area.
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Digital Restrictions (DRM)
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Vintage Computing And Gaming ☛ The PC is Dead: It’s Time to Make Computing Personal Again
The “personal computer” was once a radical idea—a computer an individual could own and control completely. The concept emerged in the early 1970s when microprocessors made it economical and practical for a person to own their very own computer, in contrast to the rise of data processing mainframes in the 1950s and 60s.
At its core, the PC movement was about a kind of tech liberty—–which I’ll define as the freedom to explore new ideas, control your own creative works, and make mistakes without punishment.
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Patents
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Kangaroo Courts
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IP Kat ☛ 2025-01-13 [Older] [UPCKat]i-mop case previews UPC's approach on decisions by default - a clean sweep? [Ed: This is an illegal "court", but this crooked author who has long lied for this illegality perpetuates this idea a fake kangaroo court is something to be respected]
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Copyrights
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Torrent Freak ☛ Authors Seek Meta’s Torrent Client Logs and Seeding Data in AI Piracy Probe
Meta is among a long list of companies being sued for allegedly using pirated material to train its AI models. Meta has never denied using copyrighted works but stressed that it would rely on a fair use defense. However, with rightsholders in one case asking for torrent client data and 'seeding lists' for millions of books allegedly shared in public, the case now takes a geeky turn.
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Torrent Freak ☛ Man Jailed For Pirate IPTV Used By "Hundreds of Thousands" Had 2,000 Users
A man who ran an IPTV piracy operation from his home in Birmingham, UK, has been sentenced to two years and nine months in prison for fraud offenses. The case is a rare example of a seller sourcing their own content but may have been slightly overhyped. Following raids in 2021, "hundreds of thousands" were said to use the service, a figure quietly rounded down to just 2,000.
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Monopolies/Monopsonies
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