Leftovers

• Robert Birming ☛ The bored blogger

  You live and you learn. You publish and you progress.

• Joel Chrono ☛ Blaugust 2025

  Blaugust is a month long blogging event where the goal is to write 31 blog posts! It’s similar to WeblogPoMo or Writing Month, and there are some weekly prompts you can follow if you need ideas.

• Jarrod Blundy ☛ Oh Shit, It’s Blaugust

  Anyway, I encourage you — yes, you! — dear reader, to join in the fun of Blaugust. There are many free blogging sites out there if you need one, but my personal recommendation is to try Micro.blog. You can get a site (that will remain on the internet even if you stop paying) for just $1 with their Micro.one plan. It’s a great service at a great deal.

• [Old] Eric Bower ☛ what is the smol web?: trying to define a movement

  The smol web attempts to simplify the modern web by making content more accessible. In this context, "accessible" means you don't necessarily need a modern browser to produce and consume content for people to enjoy. The services on the smol web don't require a ton of resources to maintain themselves. At the core of this movement is creating a platform for communication and collaboration. It's about carving out a space for us to communicate with each other outside the gaze of a few companies.

  The smol web is an attempt to unchain ourselves from the tech giants. We are here to build a web where we have the tools to communicate and collaborate without needing so much infrastructure and resources.

• Allen Pike ☛ Getting Tied Up

  But if you try to get started with knots, it’s… a lot. The Ashley Book of Knots documents 3857 of them. I downloaded the Knots 3D app, hoping it would give me some guidance. It explains 201 knots, but specifically calls out the “essential” knots: the mere 18 knots one must learn how to execute in order to survive.

• Science

  • Science News ☛ The Webb space telescope spies its first black holes snacking on stars

    The James Webb Space Telescope has taken its first look at black holes secretly snacking on stars within dusty galaxies. JWST’s ability to pick up detailed infrared signals lets it peer past the dust to probe the mostly hidden black holes, researchers report in the Aug. 1 Astrophysical Journal Letters.

  • Vintage Everyday ☛ Vintage Covers of Popular Science Magazine in the 1920s and ’30s

    Popular Science is a long-running American magazine that makes complex scientific and technological concepts accessible to general audiences. First published in 1872, the magazine has covered a vast range of topics—from groundbreaking inventions and space exploration to the latest trends in health, engineering, and environmental science.

  • Matt Wedel ☛ Journal articles are trying to do six things at once — no wonder they’re unreadable | Sauropod Vertebra Picture of the Week

    This is a brilliant insight, and it explains so much about what’s wrong with journal articles. When you’re balancing all six requirements, how are you ever going to write something that people are going to actually enjoy reading?

    Because I think Mastroianni missed out the seventh and most important thing that journal articles must do: they must tell a compelling story that communicates interesting information.

• Career/Education

  • Manuel Moreale ☛ P&B: Emma Goto

    This is the 101st edition of People and Blogs, the series where I ask interesting people to talk about themselves and their blogs. Today we have Emma Goto and her blog, emgoto.com

  • Sean Goedecke ☛ From trying to impress engineers to trying to impress managers

    Now I am a staff engineer. I effortlessly solve problems that brand-new engineers struggle to understand. I am involved with high-stakes scaling and design work: not quite at “save the entire company” level, but certainly hundreds of millions of dollars of annual revenue are in the balance. I’m happy with where I am in my career. But climbing the ladder changes who you have to impress, and that can be a difficult transition to navigate.

  • Ness Labs ☛ The Trap of the Deadline High

    It feels true because when the deadline looms, your brain kicks into overdrive. That last-minute rush can feel productive (even thrilling!) but it’s not increased performance. It’s rushed performance to compensate for weeks of avoidance and inaction.

    Procrastinating then rushing to finish a task isn’t about time management. It’s about emotion regulation. When a task feels uncertain or unpleasant, your brain looks for an escape hatch.

  • Heathkit Virtual Museum ☛ Heathkit Virtual Museum

    This website pays tribute to the 50s and 60s Heathkit® era, when electronic kit building was a pasttime enjoyed by many electronics enthusiasts and long before computers and the Internet became household words. This commemorative virtual showcase takes you back to the initial Heathkit age which began in the late 1940's and lasted through the early 1990's. Revisit some of your favorite kits and once again experience that excitement of building your first kit–and the hope that the equipment would work the first time you turned on the power.

• Hardware

  • The Straits Times ☛ Nvidia says no ‘backdoors’ in chips as China questions security

    Nvidia said it would resume H20 sales to China after Washington pledged to remove licensing curbs.

  • Tom's Hardware ☛ China raises security concerns over Nvidia's H20 Chips — hardware may expose user data or hidden tracking functions

    China has raised security concerns over Nvidia’s H20 GPU shortly after a U.S. export ban was lifted, signaling potential political pushback against American hardware.

  • Hong Kong Free Press ☛ Nvidia says no ‘backdoors’ in chips allowing remote access, as China questions security

    Nvidia chips do not contain “backdoors” allowing remote access, the US tech giant has said, after Beijing summoned company representatives to discuss “serious security issues”. The California-based company is a world-leading producer of Hey Hi (AI) semiconductors, and this month became the first company to hit $4 trillion in market value.

  • The Straits Times ☛ China summons chip giant Nvidia over alleged security risks

    The company developed the H20 specifically for export to China.

  • CNX Software ☛ AAEON PICO-MTU4-SEMI may be the world’s smallest defective chip maker Intel Core Ultra mini PC

    AAEON PICO-MTU4-SEMI is said to be the world’s smallest mini PC powered by an defective chip maker Intel Core Ultra processor at just 108 x 95 x 43mm in size. It ships with an defective chip maker Intel Core Ultra 5 125U 12-core Meteor Lake processor, up to 32GB LPDDR5 memory,  supports M.2 2280 NVMe (or SATA) SSD storage, and offers 2.5GbE and GbE ports, a Key-E socket for wireless connectivity or Hey Hi (AI) accelerator, HDMI 1.4 video output, two USB 3.2 ports, and two RS232/RS422/RS485 COM ports.

• Health/Nutrition/Agriculture

  • The Straits Times ☛ Malaysia ramps up enforcement and surveillance in haze battle

    A total of 4,247 patrols and 859 aerial surveillance missions using drones have been carried out.

  • New York Times ☛ Dihydroxyacetone Man Announces Health Care Records System for Consumers

    The administration is working with tech companies to make sharing information with various providers easier. Experts raised concerns about privacy and security.

  • US Navy Times ☛ In 1914, the US Navy went dry … but not before it threw a party

    Soon, the British, French, German, Spanish and Dutch, who were likewise harbored outside of Veracruz, got in on the act, launching roving drinking parties from ship to ship to help the Americans rid themselves of the soon-to-be contraband.

• Proprietary

  • Mansueto Ventures ☛ Microsoft’s CFO Just Sent a Company Email That’s a Master Class in How Not to Talk About Bad News

    Microsoft laid off thousands of workers in recent months. The tech giant had around 228,000 workers in mid-2024, but this May it announced it was cutting 6,000 staff. In June, another 9,000 workers got the chop. This week the company reported a blowout quarterly profit of $27 billion. Immediately afterward, CFO Amy Hood emailed staff internally. Did the company’s financial leader mention the 6 percent of people who’d been axed? No. Hood called for another year of hard work, using one word that, if anything, may unsettle Microsoft’s remaining staff.

    Hood called for “intensity.”

    Business Insider, reporting on the memo, calls this an industry buzzword — a trendy term that’s flashed around when big tech is talking about the challenges ahead, as these companies “dial up performance pressure” even as they’re making workforce cuts.

  • Business Insider ☛ Microsoft CFO calls for 'intensity' in an internal memo, after blowout earnings

    Microsoft employees should strap in for another year of "intensity," according to the software giant's top finance executive.

    The chief financial officer, Amy Hood, sent an email to employees on Wednesday after the company reported a $27 billion quarterly profit, telling them the year ahead would require "intensity, clarity, and bold execution."

  • Federal News Network ☛ NARA sees ‘encouraging’ progress toward fully electronic records

    He said 71% of federal agencies reported meeting the July 2024 deadline for managing their permanent records in an electronic format. And of the remaining agencies who said they didn’t meet the deadline, roughly half sought an exception to continue managing some of their permanent records in an analog format, Fischer said.

  • Jan Wildeboer ☛ My doorlock and my digital sovereignty - Jan Wildeboer’s Blog

    This is the story of my doorlock. It starts with me thinking about getting a new gadget, just to play with it, take it apart, understand how it works, how it can fail, how it can be sabotaged. Nothing special. I like to do that kind of thing every now and then. My target this time: a fingerprint/RFID enabled door lock.

  • Artificial Intelligence (AI) / LLM Slop / Plagiarism

    • Press Gazette ☛ Major UK publishers have seen Surveillance Giant Google search visibility ‘drop by up to 80%’ since 2019

      Likelihood of publisher keywords triggering an Hey Hi (AI) Overview increased by 3.5 times between March and June.

    • Scoop News Group ☛ Government coders are studying whether major AI models, including Grok, output hate speech

      Grok 3 is now available on Microsoft Azure, creating a pathway for GSA to study the tool, Whitman said. He emphasized that the agency was thinking about Grok from a “measurement” perspective and not putting the tool into operation. While the tool “could” be put into use, Whitman told FedScoop he didn’t want to speculate.

    • The Register UK ☛ Florida jury throws huge fine at Tesla in Autopilot crash

      The case stems from a crash in Key Largo on April 25, 2019, when Tesla Model S driver George McGee struck the pair's car after running through a stop sign and a stop light. In court, he claimed he was trying to retrieve a dropped mobile phone and thought the car would take care of things.

    • The Washington Post ☛ Tesla found partially liable for fatal 2019 crash, hit with $243 million in damages

      The outcome, including $200 milliion in punitive damages, is a stunning rebuke for Tesla, which for years has fought to absolve itself of responsibility when its driver-assistance technology is involved in a crash.

    • Wired ☛ Inside Jeffrey Epstein’s Forgotten AI Summit

      The paper speaks to the struggles of early-century AI. But one sentence truly stands out today. In a brief paragraph of acknowledgements, the authors say, “This meeting was made possible by the generous support of Jeffrey Epstein.” The symposium itself, in fact, was held in the Virgin Islands, home of Epstein’s now-notorious island retreat. Looking back at this event reveals something about the state of AI—as well as the symposium’s execrable funder.

    • Drew Breunig ☛ Does the Bitter Lesson Have Limits? | Drew Breunig

      Sutton walks through how the fields of computer chess, computer go, speech recognition, and computer vision have all experienced the bitter lesson.

      Lately, people have been citing the bitter lesson a lot.

    • Pivot to AI ☛ Figure AI’s BotQ humanoid robot is an investor demo, not a product

      But notice how the robots are handling only very light objects. They’re going super-slow. And this video was, again, really obviously cobbled together from the best clips they could get. You know how bad LLM-based AI agents are now? Imagine an LLM controlling a robot body.

    • Futurism ☛ There's a Very Basic Flaw in Mark Zuckerberg's Plan for Superintelligent AI

      The hazy announcement — which lacked virtually any degree of detail and smacked of the uninspired output of an AI chatbot — painted a rosy picture of a future where everybody uses our "newfound productivity to achieve more than was previously possible."

    • Cyble Inc ☛ AI Engine Plugin Flaw Exposes 100K Sites To RCE Risk

      A security flaw affecting over 100,000 WordPress websites has been discovered in the AI Engine plugin, specifically impacting versions 2.9.3 and 2.9.4. The vulnerability, classified as an arbitrary file upload vulnerability, allows authenticated users, starting from subscriber-level access, to upload malicious files and potentially gain remote code execution (RCE) privileges on the server. This type of vulnerability could result in full site compromise.

    • The Register UK ☛ AI means bigger margins and lock-in for enterprise vendors

      Vendors under the microscope in the study include Oracle, SAP, Workday, Microsoft, ServiceNow, and Salesforce. The analysis found that the promise of weaving AI agents into user workflows – a plan common among vendors – would only be fulfilled if organizations are also willing to invest in "the unglamorous work of process redesign."

    • Veracode ☛ Insights from 2025 GenAI Code Security Report

      If you think AI-generated code is saving time and boosting productivity, you’re right. But here’s the problem: it’s also introducing security vulnerabilities… a lot of them. In our new 2025 GenAI Code Security Report, we tested over 100 large language models across Java, Python, C#, and JavaScript. The goal? To see if today’s most advanced AI systems can write secure code.

      Unfortunately, the state of AI-generated code security in 2025 is worse than you think. What we found should be a wake-up call for developers, security leaders, and anyone relying on AI to move faster.

  • Social Control Media

    • The Straits Times ☛ Australia to force Surveillance Giant Google to conduct age checks in world-first rules for search engines

      Failure to comply could result in fines of up to $41.3 million.

    • Vox ☛ Donald Trump’s youth support is collapsing. But they’re not returning to Democrats.

      That might be true. But recent data from the Pew Research Center, and trends among the youngest American voters, complicate this picture. Just because the youth are souring on Trump doesn’t seem to suggest a rapid swing back to his opposition. Instead, it paints a worrisome picture of frustration and disengagement for both parties, as well as a reminder about the perils of relying on young voters to power political change.

  • Windows TCO / Windows Bot Nets

    • Tech Central (South Africa) ☛ The average cost of a data breach in South Africa

      A year ago, the average cost of a data breach in South Africa was R53.1-million, according to IBM, representing a nearly 17% decline. However, the average number of breached records increased to 23 445 versus 22 600 in 2024.

• Linux Foundation

  • OpenSSF (Linux Foundation) ☛ Speaking, Volunteering, Parenting, and Exploring Nature — My Week at OSS Summit NA 2025

    Earlier this summer, Eman Abu Ishgair had the privilege of attending the Open Source Summit North America 2025 in Denver — one of the largest gatherings of open source contributors, maintainers, researchers, and advocates. Even more exciting: I participated as a speaker, volunteer, and a new community member during the OpenSSF Community Day, the co-located event focused on software supply chain security and open source sustainability.

• Security

  • Trail of Bits ☛ The Unconventional Innovator Scholarship

    Trail of Bits founder Dan Guido establishes a $2,500 scholarship at his alma mater, Mineola High School, to recognize students who demonstrate the hacker spirit through self-driven learning, creative problem-solving, and unconventional technological exploration. The scholarship celebrates tomorrow’s security innovators who push boundaries and think differently about technology.

  • Security Week ☛ $1 Million Offered for WhatsApp Exploit at Pwn2Own Ireland 2025

    Meta is sponsoring ZDI’s Pwn2Own hacking competition, where participants can earn big prizes for smartphone, WhatsApp and wearable device exploits.

  • The Register UK ☛ Cybercrooks attached Raspberry Pi to bank network and drained ATM cash

    A ring of cybercriminals managed to physically implant a Raspberry Pi on a bank's network to steal cash from an Indonesian ATM.

    Group-IB reported the findings for the first time this week, telling The Register that the attack took place in Q1 2024 and involved the crooks paying "runners" to physically plant the devices on ATMs.

    The attack was attributed to what cybersecurity pros refer to as a "threat cluster" tracked as UNC2891, which was first spotted in 2017.

  • Pen Test Partners ☛ DFIR tools and techniques for tracing user footprints through Shellbags

    TL;DR  Introduction  Shellbags are a valuable forensic artifact, providing analysts with information about user interactions with folders in Windows. These registry keys record metadata such as folder paths, view settings and timestamps.

  • Privacy/Surveillance

    • Bruce Schneier ☛ Spying on People Through Airportr Luggage Delivery Service

      Airportr is a service that allows passengers to have their luggage picked up, checked, and delivered to their destinations. As you might expect, it’s used by wealthy or important people. So if the company’s website is insecure, you’d be able to spy on lots of wealthy or important people. And maybe even steal their luggage.

    • Rural crime prevention hindered by lack of surveillance infrastructure, says Mashatile

      Asked specifically what the current state of rural security surveillance infrastructure is, South African Deputy President Paul Mashatile had to tell a Parliamentary questioner it had not yet reached “under-served rural areas where crime prevention and community safety are urgent priorities”.

    • OpenRightsGroup ☛ Senator calls for US to pressure UK over Attacks on Encryption

      This press release, including the headline, has been updated as of July 31, 2025 as Surveillance Giant Google have responded to the Washington Post story.

    • Papers Please ☛ Senate postpones hearing on TSA facial recognition and ID verification

      Earlier this week the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation postponed  a scheduled hearing on a bill that would limit some uses of facial recognition by the  Transportation Security Administration (TSA), while authorizing the TSA to carry out “identity verification” of airline passengers and take mug shots of all those air travelers who don’t show an “approved identification document”.

      The original version of the “Traveler Privacy Protection Act” as it was introduced in 2023 would have imposed a straightforward prohibition on use of facial recognition by the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) without explicit Congressional authorization: “The Administrator [of the TSA] may not, for any purpose, use facial recognition technology or facial matching software in any airport unless such use is expressly authorized by an Act of Congress enacted after the date of the enactment of this Act.”

      It is, of course, a sign of how far beyond its legal authority the TSA has already gone that Congress would need to consider a bill to explicitly prohibit the TSA from exceeding the authority it has been granted by Congress. But that’s the situation we’re in.

    • The Conversation ☛ Technology could open up new ways to track prisoners

      Technology firms have apparently suggested placing tracking devices or a microchip under the skin of convicted criminals to monitor them in prison or when they come out, according to a recent report in the Guardian. Though the idea raises questions about human rights, the technology is certainly developing that could make such an initiative possible.

    • The Register UK ☛ Florida prison exposes visitor contact info to every inmate

      The allegedly leaked contact details of visitors included names, email addresses, and phone numbers, leaving many concerned for their own welfare, as well as that of their locked-up relatives.

    • The Florida Pheonix ☛ Florida prison data breach exposes visitors' contact information to inmates

      Dozens and perhaps hundreds of individuals who applied to visit inmates at Everglades Correctional Institution (ECI) in Miami-Dade County last weekend had their personal contact information shared with every inmate at that facility, according to five different individuals who have spoken to the Phoenix over the past four days.

    • The Record ☛ EU preps biometric checks for foreign visitors

      Travelers residing outside of the European Union will soon be required to have their fingerprints and faces scanned in order to enter 29 European countries, officials said Wednesday.

      Beginning on October 12 a new program known as the Entry/Exit System (EES) will be launched, requiring biometric data instead of paper checks of passports in order to cross the border to enter any of 29 countries in the so-called Schengen Area.

    • India Times ☛ UK regulator to probe 34 porn sites over age-checks

      The UK's media watchdog said Thursday it has launched investigations into 34 pornography websites over their compliance with new age-check requirements to prevent children accessing harmful online content. It requires websites and apps hosting potentially harmful pages and posts to implement age checks using measures such as facial imagery or credit cards.

    • CNBC ☛ Palantir lands $10 billion Army software and data contract

      The agreement provides purchasing flexibility and removes contract-related fees and procurement timelines, the Army said.

    • Reuters ☛ US Army pools contracts into up to $10 billion Palantir deal

      The U.S. Army on Thursday said it was consolidating dozens of contracts into a single enterprise deal with Palantir (PLTR.O), opens new tab, giving it volume-based discounts and the option to purchase up to $10 billion from the software provider over 10 years.

    • The Washington Post ☛ In Trump’s Washington, Palantir is winning big

      Beyond that, the company is potentially set to earn an order of magnitude more in federal funds. In May, Pentagon leaders allocated up to $795 million more to the military’s core artificial intelligence software program, the Palantir-built Maven Smart System, to expand its deployment to all U.S. forces around the world. And late Thursday the Army issued Palantir the company’s biggest contract — an agreement to consolidate the military’s software procurement over the next decade — at a cost of up to $10 billion.

    • Lee Peterson ☛ Should you leave a VPN on all of the time?

      I’m half expecting the UK to ban VPNs at this point.

  • Confidentiality

    • Ruud van Asseldonk ☛ Rotating my PGP key

      I estimate that the risk of unauthorized signing is very low. The leaked key was encrypted with a strong passphrase, and sent over an encrypted channel to individuals who I know and trust to not abuse the key directly, even if the passphrase were cracked. Still, this is a compromise, so I am revoking and rotating the key.

    • The New Stack ☛ Cloud Washing in the Age of AI: When ‘Sovereign’ Isn’t

      Ask yourself:

      Where does the data physically reside?
      Can the provider guarantee legal insulation from foreign jurisdictions?
      Is there true operational independence from U.S.-based control planes or APIs?

      If the answers are vague — or the architecture opaque — you’re probably looking at cloud washing.

• Defence/Aggression

  • Task And Purpose ☛ What the Navy could learn from Ukraine about sinking enemy ships

    The question now for the U.S. Navy is how much it can learn from Ukraine about using USVs against an adversary such as China.

  • The Straits Times ☛ Finnish students to return to mobile-free classrooms as laws come into force

    The Finnish National Agency for Education has called for stricter rules than set out in the law, recommending that mobile devices be banned during meal time and that their use is restricted during breaks.

  • Task And Purpose ☛ Inside the Navy’s Ghost Fleet: Uncrewed ships are here

    This quest for drone warships began in earnest in 2010 under the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency’s (DARPA) Anti-Submarine Warfare Continuous Trail Unmanned Vessel (ACTUV) program. The aim, as the name indicates, was to develop a boat that could follow submarines around the world without requiring a manned ship. The program produced a 132-foot trimaran-hulled boat called Sea Hunter, which launched in 2016.

  • Mike Brock ☛ The Fulcrum of the Gaslight

    Because here’s the truth: one party has become a conspiracy cult organized around personal loyalty to a would-be autocrat, willing to burn down democratic institutions for power. And the other… hasn’t. That’s not partisanship. That’s observation.

    To deny that difference isn’t neutrality. It’s disorientation.

  • FAIR ☛ ‘Everything Makes Sense if You Get That Most of the MAGA Base Are Members of a Cult’: CounterSpin interview with Thom Hartmann on Epstein and MAGA

    Janine Jackson interviewed the Hartmann Report‘s Thom Hartmann about Jeffrey Epstein and the MAGA movement for the July 25, 2025, episode of CounterSpin. This is a lightly edited transcript.

  • New York Times ☛ Manhattan Has More Secure Buildings Than Most Cities. That Wasn’t Enough.

    Decades of threats have heightened security in New York City. But Monday’s attack in a Park Avenue office building shows the limits of preparedness.

  • The Strategist ☛ Friends to all: No guarantee of light-touch security partnerships for Samoa

    Samoa’s election at the end of August may be seen as an opportunity for foreign partners to deepen engagement and offer new avenues of support.

  • Security Week ☛ Chinese Researchers Suggest Lasers and Sabotage to Counter MElon’s Starlink Satellites

    Chinese military and cyber researchers are intensifying efforts to counter MElon’s Starlink satellite network, viewing it as a potential tool for U.S. military power across nuclear, space, and cyber domains.

  • Federal News Network ☛ Army secretary directs West Point to rescind appointment of Biden-era cybersecurity director

    The Secretary of the Army on Wednesday directed the U.S. Military Academy at West Point to review its hiring practices.

  • Federal News Network ☛ How Salt Typhoon breached the National Guard — and what it means for U.S. cybersecurity

    "They are using vulnerabilities that have existed in the wild for a long time," said Sonu Shankar.

  • ACLU ☛ Fort Dix to Hold Thousands as Convicted Felon Militarizes Detention System

  • Russia, Belarus, and War in Ukraine

    • LRT ☛ Lithuanian MP owns drone company shares but rejects conflict of interest suspicions

      The chairman of Lithuania’s parliamentary National Security and Defense Committee, Giedrimas Jeglinskas, said Wednesday he sees no conflict of interest stemming from his investment in a company that develops drone technology.

    • Meduza ☛ Trump orders two nuclear submarines to ‘appropriate regions’ after Russian Security Council deputy chairman’s ‘foolish and inflammatory statements’ — Meduza

    • Meduza ☛ ‘It’s slow because he cares’: Belarusian president claims Putin’s humanitarian restraint in Ukraine limits Russia’s advance — Meduza

• Transparency/Investigative Reporting

  • Federal News Network ☛ It’s National Whistleblower Day and OSC is recognizing some public servants

    The employees had reported over 50 active mines in the Pacific that hadn’t been inspected since 2016 due to a clerical error.

  • Federal News Network ☛ DOJ offers to pay whistleblowers for successful antitrust claims

    "How quickly, how much will they be paying? I think that's going to underscore the effectiveness," said Ann O'Brien.

  • Rolling Stone ☛ 'Napalm Girl' Photo Controversy: Who Took the Famous Vietnam War Image?

    The Index report referred to a “frame-matching” technique that allowed precise positioning of various people present on the road that day at different times. It used still images and film that show Nghệ in his white shirt and dark vest, the film crews with their cameras and sound equipment, the tall ITN reporter Christopher Wain, Út wearing his distinct helmet with the tag, his AP flak jacket, short sleeves, a bulging camera bag on his left hip, poncho, and watch, and reconstructed the scene. Index initially concluded that just seconds after the picture was taken, Út was located roughly 200 feet away from that spot; following the AP report, which introduced new information, Index revised its estimate of the distance to roughly 75 meters or 250 feet.

• Environment

  • Science Alert ☛ World's Longest Lightning Strike Crossed 515 Miles From Texas to Kansas

    "We call it megaflash lightning."

  • Science Alert ☛ Massive Earthquake Could Strike Canada as Ancient Fault Line Wakes

    The warning signs are there.

  • Idiomdrottning ☛ Farewell, plastics

    Not only do we need to find a way to live without fossil fuels. We also need to figure out life without plastics.

  • ANF News ☛ Ecocide through mining and hydro projects in Kurdistan

    Despite strong objections from the opposition, the bill was approved and immediately sparked protests by villagers and ecology activists, who condemned it for serving the interests of mining and energy corporations at the expense of vital ecosystems and local communities.

    The bill, which also drew controversy during parliamentary debate, was pushed through in defiance of all objections. It effectively hands over numerous living spaces and natural areas in Turkey and Kurdistan to mining companies.

  • Energy/Transportation

    • Axios ☛ [Cryptocurrency] donations flood Trump's super PAC

      Why it matters: The massive infusion underscores how Trump and the [cryptocurrency] industry have been cozying up to one another.

    • YLE ☛ Finland sees fewer new car registrations

      Electric vehicles accounted for nearly a third of all new registrations during the first seven months of this year.

    • Futurism ☛ The Cybertruck Is Aging Like Fast Fashion on Temu

      When Tesla first unveiled the stainless steel Cybertruck, it was pitched as an indestructible futurist icon. Only a few short years later, many proud Cybertruck owners have discovered that their ultra-expensive rolling tanks are aging like room-temperature milk.

    • The Nation ☛ Trump’s Fossil Fuel Fanaticism Is Surrendering the Future to China

      The Trump administration has been busy stalling and rolling back regulations essential to dealing with the climate crisis. For instance, under Joe Biden, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) proposed a new heat standard that would require employers to protect workers from extreme heat. The American Prospect reported that the Trump administration has made no moves to implement this new standard and has “drastically reduced the 1,400-strong workforce of the organization that funds and develops the research supporting OSHA rules.”

    • Renewable Energy World ☛ US offshore wind, long 'dead,' now really dead

      WEAs were originally established to identify offshore locations deemed most suitable for wind energy development. By rescinding them, BOEM is ending the federal practice of designating large areas of the OCS for wind development, and is de-designating more than 3.5 million acres of unleased federal waters previously targeted for offshore wind development across the Gulf of Mexico, the Gulf of Maine, the New York Bight, California, Oregon, and the Central Atlantic.

    • Wired ☛ AC or DC: Which Is Better?

      When a power line gets to a town, it goes into a substation. This is basically just another giant transformer that reduces the AC voltage to something more manageable, like 10,000 volts. Finally, the current goes through one more transformer to get it to the 240-volt AC that enters your house. Big appliances like clothes dryers use the whole 240 V, and for your electrical outlets that gets cut in half to give you 120 V.

  • Wildlife/Nature

    • The Revelator ☛ Biomimicry Needs to Keep Evolving

    • Futurism ☛ Scientists Alarmed as Whales Suddenly Going Silent

      As a result, blue whale vocalizations dropped by almost 40 percent, according to the study, with populations of krill and anchovy collapsing.

      "When you really break it down, it’s like trying to sing while you're starving," Ryan explained. "They were spending all their time just trying to find food."

• Finance

  • Latvia ☛ OP Corporate Bank posts first half of year Latvian results

    OP Corporate Bank plc has announced its financial results for the first half of 2025 in Latvia.

  • Latvia ☛ Banks ponder changes to client language provision rules

    The right to receive all financial services in the Latvian language is provided for by changes to the Credit Institutions Law, which came into force in July.

  • New York Times ☛ Dozens Killed in Protests Over Gas Prices in Angola

    Outraged residents took to the streets of the southern African nation when a taxi strike descended into chaos.

  • The Strategist ☛ Australia should balance innovation and sovereignty in supply chain security

    Australia must strike a better balance between independent control over its defence-industrial supply chains and staying open to global innovation, particularly in dual-use technologies.

  • The Register UK ☛ Cybercrooks use Raspberry Pi to steal ATM cash

    That Raspberry Pi was equipped with a 4G modem, granting attackers remote access to the bank's internal network.

• AstroTurf/Lobbying/Politics

  • Hong Kong Free Press ☛ Macau ex-lawmaker arrested in city’s first nat. security law action

    A former Macau pro-democracy lawmaker became the first person to be arrested under the city’s national security law, with authorities alleging on Thursday that he had ties to foreign groups endangering China.

  • India Times ☛ OpenAI raises $8.3 billion at $300 billion valuation, months ahead of schedule

    OpenAI has raised $8.3 billion in funding, pushing its valuation to around $300 billion, according to The New York Times. The funding round came earlier than expected and drew strong investor interest. It follows OpenAI’s earlier plans to raise large sums, including $30 billion from SoftBank by year-end.

  • Wired ☛ Anthropic Revokes OpenAI's Access to Claude

    OpenAI lost access to the Claude API this week after Anthropic claimed the company was violating its terms of service.

  • The Verge ☛ Decoding Mark Zuckerberg’s ‘personal superintelligence” plan for Meta

    This week, I decode the meaning behind Mark Zuckerberg’s “personal superintelligence” manifesto, and what it means for the broader AI race. Keep reading for my chat with a Figma exec on the company’s IPO day, a bunch of good links, and some feedback from last week’s issue.

  • Tech Central (South Africa) ☛ Stuck in neutral, Apple misses the AI moment

    Apple’s failure to capitalise on AI is particularly important to investors, who are calling for a dramatic pivot in strategy. Many would like to see a management shakeup — or even a big acquisition, something Apple has historically shunned in favour of in-house development.

  • [Old] Kieran Healy ☛ American - kieranhealy.org

    Q1. What is the supreme law of the land?

    The Constitution

  • European Commission ☛ Electronic signatures and seals - qualified trust service applications (implementing act)

    Feedback (15)
    Warning: Automatic translations may not be 100% accurate.

• Censorship/Free Speech

  • Hong Kong Free Press ☛ UK to ‘never allow’ political extradition of Hongkongers after alarm over law changes

    The UK security minister has said the country would “never” allow Hongkongers to be extradited for political reasons, after activists raised alarm that changes to an extradition act could put them at risk.

  • Hong Kong Free Press ☛ Hong Kong man arrested for allegedly threatening media outlets to publish ‘seditious’ report

    Hong Kong’s national security police have arrested a man for allegedly threatening multiple media outlets to publish a report promoting a fundraising website for wanted activists.

  • AccessNow ☛ #KeepItOn: Syrian government must restore internet access and respect rights in Suwayda

    We call on the Syrian government to immediately and fully restore internet access and to ensure the protection of people’s rights in Suwayda.

  • RFERL ☛ Dissenting In Iran? You Won't Be Needing Your SIM Card, Then

    • Iran Requires Praise Online To Regain SIM Access: The Islamic republic is cutting off cell service for Iranians who criticize the state online. To get reconnected, some have been told to post messages supporting the political establishment, RFE/RL’s Radio Farda has learned.

  • Meduza ☛ Even when the Internet works in Russia, something on it doesn’t. Here’s what’s broken over the past month.

    In Russia, Internet outages have become routine. Website crashes and service disruptions are nothing new, either. But the most serious incident came on July 28, when Ukrainian and Belarusian hackers broke into Aeroflot’s internal systems — delaying 150 flights, stranding at least 20,000 passengers, and costing the airline more than 250 million rubles (over $3 million). And it was far from the only disruption that month. Some appeared to be the result of cyberattacks, others possibly linked to state-imposed blocks. In many cases, the cause remains unclear. Meduza takes a look back at all of the services that broke across the Russian Internet over the past month.

  • India Times ☛ Reddit surges as AI-driven ad strategy wins praise from Wall Street

    The company has also posted a rosy forecast that comes on the heels of similarly upbeat results from ad industry leaders such as Meta and Alphabet, underscoring a broader sector shift as advertisers gravitate towards platforms that provide artificial-intelligence tools to create more personalized campaigns.

  • Los Angeles Times ☛ Trump freezes $300 million in UCLA science, medical research funding, citing antisemitism allegations

    In a letter to the university community Thursday, Frenk wrote that the canceled grants are from NSF, NIH and other federal agencies, but he did not give a dollar amount or list the other agencies. A partial list of suspended grants reviewed by The Times Thursday added up to roughly $200 million. The list was provided by a source who was not authorized to share the information.

  • CPJ ☛ Iran arrests 98 ‘citizen-journalists’ for contact with UK-based outlet

    “Iranian authorities must immediately clarify the legal basis for this mass detention of its citizens and cease treating those who communicate with the media as criminals,” said CPJ Chief Programs Officer Carlos Martinez de la Serna. “Labeling ordinary Iranians as ‘operational agents’ simply for their association with a news outlet is a dangerous tactic of intimidation and a blatant escalation in Iran’s violations of press freedom.

  • The Moscow Times ☛ Russia Declares Navalny Memoir ‘Extremist’ - The Moscow Times

    Russia's Justice Ministry added late opposition leader Alexei Navalny’s memoir “Patriot” to its list of “extremist” materials Wednesday — a move that bans the book — following a decision by the Leningrad Regional Court in June.

  • The Moscow Times ☛ Putin Signs Law Criminalizing Searches for ‘Extremist’ Content

    Yekaterina Mizulina, head of the Kremlin-aligned Safe Internet League and a prominent advocate of online censorship, voiced unease over the bill earlier this month. She warned that it could obstruct the League’s work, roughly 30% of which involves identifying extremist content and forwarding it to authorities.

• Freedom of Information / Freedom of the Press

  • The Independent UK ☛ Corporation for PBS and NPR says it’s ending operations after Trump cuts

    The Corporation for Public Broadcasting says it will wind down its operations after the Trump administration and Congress slashed its funding.

    The organization funds PBS and NPR, as well as more than 1,500 local TV and radio stations. The “majority of staff positions” will end on September 30, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting said in a statement. A “small transition team” will remain through January 2026 to help close out operations.

  • BIA Net ☛ Court extends detention of journalist Ercüment Akdeniz in 'terrorism' case

    Akdeniz, the former editor-in-chief of the leftist newspaper Evrensel, has been held at Marmara (Silivri) Prison on the outskirts of İstanbul since Feb 22.

  • Open Caucasus Media ☛ ‘She represents the free press’ — Imprisoned Georgian media founder’s final statement delayed

    The closing statement of Mzia Amoghlobeli, the detained founder of the Georgian media outlets Batumelebi and Netgazeti, has been postponed to 4 August. Amoghlobeli herself requested the postponement after Friday’s exhausting session that lasted more than nine hours in Batumi City Court.

  • ANF News ☛ Journalist Ercüment Akdeniz not released after 160 days in detention

    All the charges brought against me are false. There is no evidence, no records. The accusation of ‘membership in an organization’ is materially baseless. Everything I have done either falls under journalism or activities related to EMEP. Because I have been detained for such a long time, my right to freedom of the press has been violated. The only HDK-related event I ever participated in was a single panel on migration. I demand acquittal and release, for the sake of truth and justice.”

  • Greece ☛ Journalist dies after self-immolation at capital’s Zappeion Gardens

    A 67-year-old journalist who set herself on fire at the Zappeion Gardens in Athens on Wednesday has died from her injuries, it was announced on Friday.

  • CPJ ☛ A year after new Bangladesh leader vows reform, journalists still behind bars 

    On March 5, 2025, in a crowded Dhaka courtroom, journalist Farzana Rupa stood without a lawyer as a judge moved to register yet another murder case against her. Already in jail, she quietly asked for bail. The judge said the hearing was only procedural.

  • CPJ ☛ Burundi journalist Sandra Muhoza still behind bars, 2 months after appeal ruling

    “It is a grave injustice that Sandra Muhoza remains behind bars two months after an appeal court effectively invalidated her earlier trial and conviction,” said CPJ Africa Program Coordinator Muthoki Mumo. “Authorities must do the right thing and release Muhoza without further delay.”

• Civil Rights/Policing

  • BoingBoing ☛ "Everybody is vulnerable": Your eroding rights at the border under Trump

    Here, Wessler looks ahead to the legal battles on the horizon and shares his deepest concern: an administration that has already violated court orders and shows increasing contempt for judicial oversight. "Members of this administration keep saying things about how they don't think that they have to listen to courts," he told us. The question isn't whether they'll push boundaries — they already have. The question is how far they'll go.

    Are you concerned that the executive branch is not going to respect court decisions that rule in favor of protecting people's Fourth Amendment rights?

• Internet Policy/Net Neutrality

  • APNIC ☛ IEPG at IETF 123

    External ISP network disruptions, triggering QUIC, BGP path attributes, and a regional standards forum?

  • Dr molly tov ☛ storytime: the neediest, pleadiest ex i ever dumped | dr molly tov

    Yep: My neediest, plead-iest, won't-take-the-hint-iest ex ever is Verizon.

    I ditched Verizon over two years ago for Mint Mobile. My only regret is not making the switch sooner. I cut my monthly phone bill by something like 75 percent, and Mint turned out to be more consistently reliable. Also, my available data went up: I moved from an 8G/month plan on Verizon to "unlimited" on Mint and STILL saved a ton of money.

  • India Times ☛ Network fee on Big Tech not a viable solution to boost EU digital rollout, EU says

    The European Commission does not think that imposing a network fee on Big Tech companies is a viable solution to the debate over who should fund the rollout of 5G and broadband, a spokesman for the EU executive said on Thursday.

• Digital Restrictions (DRM)

  • [Old] Ars Technica ☛ Secure Boot is completely broken on 200+ models from 5 big device makers

    The researchers soon discovered that the compromise of the key was just the beginning of a much bigger supply-chain breakdown that raises serious doubts about the integrity of Secure Boot on more than 300 additional device models from virtually all major device manufacturers. As is the case with the platform key compromised in the 2022 GitHub leak, an additional 21 platform keys contain the strings “DO NOT SHIP” or “DO NOT TRUST.”

  • [Old] Ars Technica ☛ Just about every Windows and Linux device vulnerable to new LogoFAIL firmware attack - Ars Technica

    LogoFAIL is a constellation of two dozen newly discovered vulnerabilities that have lurked for years, if not decades, in Unified Extensible Firmware Interfaces responsible for booting modern devices that run Windows or Linux. The vulnerabilities are the product of almost a year’s worth of work by Binarly, a firm that helps customers identify and secure vulnerable firmware.

Monopolies/Monopsonies

• Digital Music News ☛ Google Loses Appeal of Order to Revamp App Store Policies

  Google failed to persuade a U.S. appeals court to overturn the federal court order requiring the company to revamp its app store. On Thursday, Surveillance Giant Google lost its appeal to overturn a jury verdict and federal court order requiring the company to overhaul its app store.

• The Register UK ☛ Court upholds Epic win in Google Play Store antitrust battle

  The three-judge panel in the Ninth Circuit US Court of Appeals affirmed the previous order forbidding Google from engaging in business practices including prohibiting developers from directing users away from its payment services, a tactic used to bolster the company's Play Store dominance.

• Manton Reece ☛ We will survive Google Zero

  Google Zero is slightly misunderstood. The problem is not that Google is nefarious in no longer sending traffic to your website. (They probably don’t care very much one way or the other.) The real problem is you’ve depended on Google for your business. You’ve been obsessed with SEO and search ads for years, all built around a single search company.

• Deccan Chronicle ☛ Google Must Open Android To Rival App Stores: US Court

  The ruling clears the way for the Epic Games shop to operate within the Google Play Store despite the latter's requirement that apps use Google's payment system, which collects commissions on transactions.

• Patents

  • Repackaging the Same Flawed Ideas on Patent Quality

    This month, the IP Policy Institute at the University of Akron School of Law released a policy brief, “Measuring Patent Quality and Reducing the Backlog at the USPTO,” presenting it as new empirical research.

  • JUVE ☛ Bittersweet win for inventor against Aldi at Regional Court Düsseldorf

    The dispute centres on German patent monopoly DE 10 2017 008 892.6, which protects a stack securing device for transport trucks. This device secures CC containers, commonly used in the wholesale plant trade, when stacked.

  • JUVE ☛ HP and Freshfields successfully defend printer cartridges in Munich

    In a series of lawsuits concerning various patents, Hewlett Packard Development is taking action at Munich Regional Court against several European and Chinese companies of the Ninestar Group. The companies sell Doreink brand printer cartridges on platforms such as Amazon. According to HP, the Doreink cartridges use HP’s patented technology.

  • Dennis Crouch/Patently-O ☛ Ideology, Expertise, and the Evolving Federal Circuit

    In my recent post, I traced how the Federal Circuit’s composition has shifted from a 10-1 Republican majority in the early 1990s to its present 8-3 Democratic-appointed tilt. Dennis Crouch, The Federal Circuit's Shifting Political Balance, Patently-O (June 15, 2025).  That transformation has not only symbolic weight, but also real jurisprudential and institutional consequences, especially as the court faces more politically charged litigation such as the pending V.O.S. Selections v. Convicted Felon case.  I note that the Federal Circuit’s response—en banc proceedings and unanimous per curiam orders—may reflect an institutional effort to shield itself from claims of partisanship.

  • Dennis Crouch/Patently-O ☛ USPTO Closes AAPA Door: New Memo Practically Reverses Shockwave from Below

    The USPTO moved swiftly to shut down any hope that the Federal Circuit's recent decision in Shockwave Medical, Inc. v. Cardiovascular Systems, Inc., No. 2023-1864 (Fed. Cir. July 14, 2025) had opened a broader pathway for using applicant-admitted prior art (AAPA) to supply missing claim limitations in inter partes review (IPR) proceedings. In a memorandum dated July 31, 2025 (two weeks after Shockwave), Acting Director Coke Morgan Stewart announced that the agency will "enforce and no longer waive" the requirement of 37 C.F.R. § 42.104(b)(4) that IPR petitions "must specify where each element of the claim is found in the prior art patents or printed publications relied upon." 

• Copyrights

  • Public Domain Review ☛ Cannibal Modernity: Oswald de Andrade’s Manifesto Antropófago (1928)

    A modernist manifesto inspired (controversially) by the Tupi people of Brazil.

  • Press Gazette ☛ Who’s suing Hey Hi (AI) and who’s signing: Gannett signs up with Perplexity [Ed: Out of court settlement, de facto]

  • Torrent Freak ☛ Belgium Targets Internet Archive's 'Open Library' in Sweeping Site Blocking Order (Update)

    The Business Court in Brussels, Belgium, has issued a broad site-blocking order that aims to restrict access to shadow libraries including Anna's Archive, Libgen, OceanofPDF, Z-Library, and the Internet Archive's Open Library. In addition to ISP blocks, the order also directs search engines, DNS resolvers, advertisers, domain name services, CDNs and hosting companies to take action. For now, Open Library doesn't appear to be actively blocked.

  • Torrent Freak ☛ Belgium Bans Internet Archive's 'Open Library' in Sweeping Site Blocking Order

    The Business Court in Brussels, Belgium, has issued an unprecedentedly broad site-blocking order that aims to restrict access to shadow libraries including Anna's Archive, Libgen, OceanofPDF, Z-Library, and the Internet Archive's Open Library. In addition to ISP blocks, the order also directs search engines, DNS resolvers, advertisers, domain name services, CDNs and hosting companies to take action.

  • Torrent Freak ☛ U.S. Senators Introduce New Pirate Site Blocking Bill: Block BEARD

    Efforts to introduce pirate site blocking to the United States continue with the introduction of the "Block BEARD" bill in the Senate. The bipartisan proposal, backed by Senators Tillis, Coons, Blackburn, and Schiff, aims to create a new legal mechanism to combat foreign piracy websites. Block BEARD is similar to the previously introduced House bill "FADPA", but doesn't directly mention DNS resolvers.