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● 03.01.16

● Links 1/3/2016: Firefox OS in Panasonic Ultra HD TVs, Raspberry Pi 3

Posted in News Roundup at 11:42 am by Dr. Roy SchestowitzContentsGNU/LinuxGNU/Linux

=> ↺ Does Linux need a data loss prevention solution?

• CoSoSys, a firm that offers data loss prevention (DLP) and mobile device management (MDM) solutions, today announced a private beta release of Endpoint Protector DLP for Linux.

• Yes, Linux is secure by design, but that doesn’t mean there won’t be software bugs (Linus Torvalds has said as much, noting that bugs are part of the software development process). And, yes, there have been some critical security threats that surfaced in the last few years such as GHOST, ShellShock, Heartbleed, and the Glibc vulnerability

• But CoSoSys is not about that security. It’s not about the security of the operating system itself. It’s about the data residing on these machines and protecting the data irrespective of the operating system.

=> ↺ Linux gives me all the tools I need

• Linux is all around us. It’s on our phones in the form of Android. It’s used on the International Space Station. It provides much of the backbone of the Internet. And yet many people never notice it. Discovering Linux is a rewarding endeavor. Lots of other people have shared their Linux stories on Opensource.com, and now it’s my turn.

• I still remember when I first discovered Linux in 2008. The person who helped me discover Linux was my father, Socrates Ballais. He was an economics professor here in Tacloban City, Philippines. He was also a technology enthusiast. He taught me a lot about computers and technology, but only advocated using Linux as a fallback operating system in case Windows fails.

Kernel Space

=> ↺ Linux 4.5-rc6

• I wish rc6 was smaller, but at the same time I’m just relieved that Kirill found and fixed the problem with the THP cleanup series that had plagued us this release cycle. So I can’t really complain. Adding to my relief is that another scary bug-report turned out to not be a kernel bug at all, but a microcode issue. Which might perhaps be worse, but at least it’s not something we did (and now that it’s known it’s avoidable).

• The diffstat looks odd this time because there’s a big patch to one of the network driver header files that makes it look like the include directory is almost 40% of the whole change. But that patch just renames a ton of reserved fields, no actual code change.

=> ↺ Linux 4.5-rc6 Kernel Released

=> ↺ Linus Torvalds Announces Linux Kernel 4.5 RC6, Final Release Launches March 2016

=> ↺ Linux Kernel 3.2.78 LTS Improves the Btrfs File System, Updates Several Drivers

• After the release of the Linux kernel 4.4.3 LTS, Linux Kernel 3.10.98 LTS, Linux Kernel 3.14.62 LTS, and Linux kernel 4.5 RC6, we’re now informing our GNU/Linux readers about the availability of Linux kernel 3.2.78 LTS.

=> ↺ Linux Kernel 3.12.55 LTS Has Btrfs and PA-RISC Fixes, Multiple Updated Drivers

• After the release of the long-term supported Linux 4.4.3, Linux 3.10.98, Linux 3.14.62, and Linux 3.2.78 kernels, we are now informing you of the debut of Linux kernel 3.12.55 LTS.

=> ↺ The Linux Foundation Partners with Women Who Code to Increase Diversity at 2016 Events

• Part of our mission at The Linux Foundation is to bring more people into the open source community, which involves reaching people who have traditionally been underrepresented in open source specifically and technology generally.

• As part of this continuing effort, we are proud to partner with Women Who Code to provide free passes and 20 percent discounts for their members and subscribers to attend The Linux Foundation’s various events around the world. Women Who Code was created in 2011 and is best known for its weekly publication the CODE Review and free technical study groups, hack nights, career development, and speaking events featuring influential technology industry experts and investors. Their focus on education aligns with our goal to increase access to Linux and open source learning materials, helping to grow the Linux and open source talent pool, increases diversity in technology and provides the pathway to the most lucrative jobs in IT.

Graphics Stack

=> ↺ libinput and graphics tablet support

Benchmarks

=> ↺ The Performance Impact Of Turbo Boost On Linux

• After the tests this weekend of Intel Hyper Threading and core scaling with the new Intel Xeon E3 “Skylake” processor, I proceeded to do some Turbo Boost benchmarking.

• Namely, I ran a set of open-source Linux benchmarks when the Xeon E3 1280 v5 was running in its default mode with four cores plus Hyper Threading and Intel EIST+TB enabled and then again when disabling Turbo Boost support from the BIOS. The Xeon E3 1280 v5 has a 3.7GHz base frequency and 4.0GHz boost frequency. The 80 Watt TDP processor was cooled by a Arctic Freezer i11.

=> ↺ GCC Optimization Level Benchmarks With A 4GHz Intel Skylake CPU On Ubuntu 64-bit

• With it being trivial to deploy new benchmark test cases with the Phoronix Test Suite and it being fully-automated, the latest results of our Xeon E3 v5 Skylake CPUs are some GCC reference benchmarks with various optimization levels to see the impact on the performance of the generated binaries as well as build time.

• Similar to the other Xeon Skylake benchmarks this weekend, I tested on the Xeon E3-1280 v5 CPU that has a 3.7GHz base frequency with 4.0GHz turbo frequency. The tests were using the MSI C236A Workstation motherboard and thanks to MSI Computer for making all of this Linux testing possible.

Applications

=> ↺ Transmission 2.90 Open-Source BitTorrent Client Released After Two Years of Work

• We never thought that we will see a new, major stable version of the Transmission open-source and cross-platform BitTorrent client, ever, but what a surprise, Transmission 2.90 arrived on February 28, 2016.

=> ↺ Transmission 2.90 Adds CMake Support, Many Fixes & More

=> ↺ Crowd-funded OpenShot 2.0 delivers graphic Linux package

• While the cross platform aspect is nice, Windows and Mac OS both already have very capable, free video editors. The real winners here are Linux users who now have an editor that’s on par with Apple’s iMovie (even more powerful than recent versions of iMovie) and bears considerable resemblance to the industry-standard Final Cut Pro.

• As I noted in my review of video editors for Linux, OpenShot was once the go-to standard for video editing on GNOME-based distros. And now with 2.0, OpenShot is back and better than ever.

=> ↺ OpenSSH 7.2 Out Now with Support for RSA Signatures Using SHA-256/512 Algorithms

• Today, February 29, 2016, the OpenBSD project had the great pleasure of announcing the release and immediate availability for download of OpenSSH 7.2 for all supported platforms.

=> ↺ OpenSSH 7.2

=> ↺ New CRAN package gunsales

• A new package gunsales is now on the CRAN network for R. It is based the NYTimes/gunsales repository underlying the excellent New York Times visualizations, first published first in December 2015 and updated with more recent data since.s

=> ↺ Plex Media Server For Linux, Sync Media Across All Of Your Devices

• Today I am going to review the app that media lovers are going to like a lot. It’s not just an app but a media server that holds your media and sync it across all of your devices so that you can get your media anytime, anywhere. We’re going to sync media using Plex Media Server for Linux. Plex media server is available for all operating systems including Linux operating systems, Ubuntu, Fedora and CentOS and all other derivatives.

=> ↺ 42 Best Free Linux Graphics Software

• Linux has matured into an excellent platform for artists, photographers, animators, and designers. With inexpensive hardware, free software, and a modicum of talent and inspiration, anyone can create professional-looking computer graphics.

• There is a huge range of open source software available to create, modify and convert 2D and 3D computer graphics. To provide an insight into the software that is available, we have compiled a list of 42 high quality Linux graphics applications. All but one is released under an open source license (XnView MP).

Proprietary

=> ↺ Skype for Linux Breaks. People Blame Microsoft. Are We Surprised?

• Microsoft declared its love for Linux more than a year ago. But some open source fans have not been feeling much love from Redmond in the wake of reports that the newest version of Skype for Linux doesn’t really work, and Microsoft is doing little to fix the problem.

Instructionals/Technical

=> ↺ How To: Install/Upgrade to Linux Kernel 4.4.3 in Ubuntu/Linux Mint Systems

=> ↺ AWS at the command line

=> ↺ How to install Vesta Control Panel on a Linux VPS

=> ↺ Hackery to get going RDO Kilo on Fedora 23

=> ↺ Useful command line options for ansible-playbook

=> ↺ Ansible install configure and use

=> ↺ New Zaphod release – v0.5.7

=> ↺ Ansible – install and configure WordPress for multiple nodes

=> ↺ How to setup distcc (and ccache) in Builder

=> ↺ Ansible playbooks

=> ↺ Ways to Change the Resolution of Text Terminal (TTY)

=> ↺ Cast audio from Debian to chromecast audio

=> ↺ Oh, yes, for those old enough to have seen one…

=> ↺ GCC 6: -Wmisleading-indentation vs “goto fail;”

=> ↺ [Kolab] You Board First When You Have Status

=> ↺ Hands-On: Upgrading my Acer Aspire Z3 with an SSD

• Wow, does this ever explain a lot of things about how this Aspire Z3 has been behaving for EFI boot! Now that I have gotten over the initial surprise (and irritation) of finding this, I have to say that this is a powerful and flexible way to manage the EFI boot priority list. But geez, could they have buried it any deeper, and made it any more obscure than this?

• So, my very lovely Acer Aspire Z3 All-In-One desktop system is running even better, from an SSD. Even better, it is completely Windows-free. What a nice weekend this has been!

Games

=> ↺ Vendetta Online 1.8.371 3D Space Combat Game Re-Adds the Furie-Related Missions

• Guild Software had the great pleasure of announcing this past weekend the general availability of yet another maintenance release in the Vendetta Online 1.8 series of the popular and cross-platform MMORPG game.

=> ↺ We Are The Dwarves, a real-time tactical adventure now on Linux, some thoughts

• Today I took a look at We Are The Dwarves on Linux. It looks good and I love these games, but is it any good?

=> ↺ Spring RTS Open-Source Engine 101.0 Released

• Spring RTS 101.0 has been released with performance improvements, bug fixes, and new features.

• Spring RTS 101.0 brings support for custom shaders and map drawing via Lua scripting, line of sight refactoring, refactoring of transports, an internal pr-downloader, and a ton of fixes.

=> ↺ There Are Now 1,900 Steam Linux Games Available For Download

• As of this evening on Steam, there are 1,900 released games available for download with native Linux support.

• After a recent Steam change, there were more than 1,900 Steam Linux games listed as Valve ended up including yet-to-be-released Linux game ports. That total including unreleased Linux games is now up to 2,009! But in terms of released Linux game titles available for download right now, the 1,900 threshold was crossed tonight to end out February.

=> ↺ XWayland Gains Partial XvidMode Support To Run Older Linux Games

• The latest X.Org Server code’s XWayland support path now is able to run some older Linux games.

• Landing within the X.Org Server Git code-base is partial xvidmode extension support for XWayland, for running older Linux games that lack native Wayland support, such as those making use of SDL1. The work was done by Red Hat’s Olivier Fourdan.

=> ↺ American Truck Simulator On Linux

• Another year, another simulation game from S.C.S Software. I should preface this article by saying I am not usually a fan of simulation game– whether they be truck, plane, bus, or anything else. That being said… I might be a convert after this.

Desktop Environments/WMs

GNOME Desktop/GTK

=> ↺ GNOME Tweak Tool Review – More Powerful than You Can Imagine

• GNOME Tweak Tool is a powerful application for the GNOME-powered Linux distributions, and it’s too often overlooked.

=> ↺ GNOME Maps Review – A GNOME App That Could Do Much More

• GNOME Maps is a rather new application in the GNOME stack that doesn’t do a lot but is really promising. Here is a quick look at the latest stable edition.

=> ↺ Internships in usability testing

• Are you interested in free and open source software? Do you use GNOME? Then consider applying for an internship with Outreachy!

• GNOME and other projects are offering paid, mentored, remote internships to people from groups underrepresented in free and open source software as part of the Outreachy project. This round is open internationally to women (cis and trans), trans men, and genderqueer people. Outreachy is also open in the U.S. to participants with Black/African American, Hispanic/Latin, American Indian, Alaska Native, Native Hawaiian, or Pacific Islander backgrounds.

=> ↺ Some changes in GNOME Documents

• As I said in the previous post, my contribution to GNOME was not limited to Google Summer of Code. In this cycle I continued to work mainly on GNOME Documents by fixing some bugs, polishing the GUI and adding a new feature. Since I’m doing this in my free time I didn’t work on it as much as I would like to, but I’m quite happy to be part of this community.

=> ↺ GUADEC 2016 GNOME Developer Conference Takes Place on August 12–14 in Germany

• The GNOME Project was happy to announce that this year’s GUADEC (GNOME Users And Developers European Conference) event will take place on August 12–14 in Karlsruhe, Germany.

Distributions

Reviews

=> ↺ MX-15 review – Highway to rad

• I’m impressed. Not like shiver me timbers, I’m dancing naked in front of a mirror while Manhunter plays in the background, but still quite amazed by what MX-15 offers. On the negative side, we have some visual inconsistencies, a geeky and slightly dangerous installer, a system area that needs shaping up, Fn buttons and volume (ground) control, and a few other space oddities.

• Then, on the bright side, super fast, super lean, works great on modern hardware without hiccups or whining, excellent media and smartphone support, awesome battery life, a good collection of programs and wicked tools, and still more. Well, you know, you’ve just read the review, haven’t you, you impatient conclusion-only pervs. Anyhow, really neat. MX Linux has come a long, long way since its early days. It is shaping up to be a really nice distribution, and my biggest fear at this point is that it will die, like so many other distros have died before reaching that critical mass moment.

• To sum it up, if you’re looking for something different, something less avant-garde, whatever that means, or rather, you’re fed up with the love triangle of Ubuntu, SUSE and Fedora plus derivatives, then MX-15 might be what you want. Somewhat of an underdog, and a bit scruffy and mongrely at times, but I like the progress. I like the consistent approach. It’s a key to greatness. 9/10. It sure has joined my watch shortlist. Worth testing and whatnot. But my fear of the future always remains, please prove me wrong. However, the present is happy, so start downloading and burning them coasters. Dedoimedo out.

New Releases

=> ↺ OpenELEC 6.0.2 released

• The OpenELEC 6.0.2 release has been published. Users running OpenELEC 5.95.1 thru 6.0.1 with auto-update enabled will be prompted on-screen to reboot and apply the update once it has been downloaded. Users running older OpenELEC releases or with auto-update disabled will need to manually update. If you would like to update from an older OpenELEC release please read update instructions/advice on the wiki before updating. Manual update files can be obtained from the downloads page.

=> ↺ OpenELEC 6.0.2 Released for Raspberry Pi 3, Patches the Glibc DNS Vulnerability

• We’ve already told you a couple of days ago that Raspberry Pi 3 will be released in February with Wi-Fi and Bluetooth LE support, but we never though it would be today, February 29, 2016.

• And it appears that most of the developers making software for the Raspberry Pi single-board computer already knew that, as, for example, the guys over at OpenELEC just announced a few minutes ago the release and immediate availability for download of OpenELEC 6.0.2 with support for Raspberry Pi 3.

=> ↺ Solus 1.1 Is Going to Be Awesome, Developers Promise

• The Solus developers are preparing for the first point release for their Linux operating system, and saying they are excited about it is an understatement.

=> ↺ Netrunner Rolling 2016.1 Brings KDE Plasma 5.5.4 and Linux Kernel 4.4.2

• Netrunner Rolling is a Linux distribution based on Manjaro that features KDE as the default desktop environment, and a new version has been released and is now available for download.

Gentoo Family

=> ↺ Sabayon 16.03

• Sabayon 16.03 is a modern and easy to use Linux distribution based on Gentoo, following an extreme, yet reliable, rolling release model.

• This is a monthly release generated, tested and published to mirrors by our build servers containing the latest and greatest collection of software available in the Entropy repositories.

• The ChangeLog files related to this release are available on our mirrors.

=> ↺ Gentoo-Based Sabayon 16.03 Linux Distro Finally Switches to Linux Kernel 4.4 LTS

• The development team behind the Gentoo-bBased Sabayon Linux operating system were happy to announce the release and immediate availability for download of the March set of Live ISOs for the distribution.

=> ↺ Gentoo Ought to be About Choice

• “Gentoo is about choice.” We’ve said it so often that it seems like we just don’t bother to say it any more. However, with some of the recent conflicts on the lists (which I’ve contributed to) and indeed across the FOSS community at large, I think this is a message that is worth repeating…

• Ok, bare with me because I’m going to talk about systemd. This post isn’t really about systemd, but it would probably not be nearly as important in its absence. So, we need to talk about why I’m bringing this up.

Ballnux/SUSE

=> ↺ openSUSE News: Organizing Team seeks input for planning conference

• The Organizing Team has planned a pre-conference party in Nuremberg on June 21 at the Kater Murr. More details about the pre-conference party will become available in the next few weeks.

Red Hat Family

=> ↺ [Red Hat CEO:] What it means to be an open source leader

• Being a leader in an open organization, then, means making connections: It involves doing the work of linking people both to each other and to some larger, shared picture. It’s helping people understand how they can contribute to a collective effort in meaningful ways.

• [...]

• In conventional organizations, “knowledge is power.” But in open organizations, that well-worn adage can be a destructive and downright disastrous guiding principle.

=> ↺ Red Hat: which open source personality type are you?

• In this article, Savage takes a look at the different traits of people who contribute, what their aims are… and how other programmer should aim to balance them out when reading all those comments on pull requests.

=> ↺ Sizzling Stock Alert: salesforce.com, inc. (CRM), Red Hat Inc (RHT)

=> ↺ This entrepreneur ‘accidentally’ built Gluster, which was acquired by RedHat for $136 million

• The world was still reeling from the shock of the 9/11 attacks and the global economy wasn’t prepared for this kind of blow. Yet, for Anand Babu (AB) Periasamy and his team at California Digital Corporation (CDC), it was a crucial time that was spent building ‘Thunder’ – the world’s fastest super computer for the US Department of Energy. From building a supercomputer to founding Gluster and now Minio, it has been a long journey for AB from Mettur Dam in Tamil Nadu.

=> ↺ Red Hat, Amdocs collaborate for new CSP solution

• Red Hat has announced that Amdocs has integrated Red Hat Enterprise Linux OpenStack Platform with the Amdocs Network Cloud Service Orchestrator – an open, vendor-agnostic, catalogue-driven solution designed to help communications service providers (CSPs) transition from physical networks to cloud service environments.

=> ↺ BlockApps Launches Ethereum Developer Sandbox on Red Hat’s OpenShift

=> ↺ Red Hat and BlockApps Partnernship Sees Enterprise Level Blockchain Development

=> ↺ Eurotech and Red Hat Collaborate to Power More Secure and Scalable Internet-of-Things Implementations

=> ↺ Red Hat Inc (RHT) Shares Bought by Korea Investment CORP

• Korea Investment CORP raised its position in Red Hat Inc (NYSE:RHT) by 25.7% during the fourth quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The fund owned 260,585 shares of the open-source software company’s stock after buying an additional 53,300 shares during the period. Korea Investment CORP owned approximately 0.14% of Red Hat worth $21,579,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

=> ↺ Russell Frank Co Has $53,685,000 Position in Red Hat Inc (RHT)

• Russell Frank Co reduced its stake in shares of Red Hat Inc (NYSE:RHT) by 0.0% during the fourth quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The fund owned 641,766 shares of the open-source software company’s stock after selling 88 shares during the period. Russell Frank Co owned approximately 0.35% of Red Hat worth $53,685,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

=> ↺ Nippon Life Insurance Co. Acquires 7,087 Shares of Red Hat Inc (RHT)

=> ↺ Robert W. Baird Cuts Red Hat Inc (RHT) Price Target to $80.00

=> ↺ 307,494 Shares in Red Hat Inc (RHT) Acquired by Smith Asset Management Group LP

=> ↺ EPS Estimate For Red Hat, Inc. (NYSE:RHT)

• After studying the fundamentals of Red Hat, Inc. (NYSE:RHT), the Wall Street has given its shares a price target of $86.941. This forecast was given after Zacks completed the poll including as many as 17 experts. As per the survey, the broad price range is set from a high of $97 to low of $75.

=> ↺ Red Hat Inc. (RHT) Falls 3.35% for February 29

=> ↺ Stock Rating & Analysis on Red Hat, Inc. (NYSE:RHT)

Fedora

=> ↺ F23-20160229 Updated Lives Available Now.

=> ↺ ‘Getting Started with Fedora’ handbook – update

• In October, I announced that we’d finally finished and printed a handbook for users who start with Fedora. It was a pilot created in the Czech community of Fedora, so we wrote the handbook in Czech first. The goal was to translate it to English if it proves to be good.

=> ↺ Notes on a mass upgrade to Fedora 23

• One of the hardest parts of running Fedora in a school setting is keeping on top of the upgrades, and I ended up falling a few months behind. Fedora 23 was released back in November, and it took me until February to start the upgrade process.

=> ↺ dgplug summer training student Sanyam Khurana

=> ↺ HACK CAMP 2016 FEDORA-GNOME [Session One]

• Yesterday we celebrated the installation of the Release FEDORA 23 as part of the event HACK CAMP 2016 by FEDORA & GNOME.

=> ↺ Fedora Cloud WG during last week of 2016-02

• Fedora Cloud Working Group meets every Wednesday at 17:00UTC on #fedora-meeting-1 IRC channel on Freenode server. This week we had 15 people attending the meeting, which is in the regular range of the meeting attendees. The points need to be discussed in the meeting are generally being tracked on the fedorahosted trac as trac tickets with a special keyword meeting. This basically means if you want something to be discussed in the next cloud meeting, add a ticket there with the meeting keyword.

=> ↺ Fedora 24 and Rawhide: What’s goin’ on (aka why is everything awful)

• Welp, I was doing a Fedora 24 status update in the QA meeting this morning, and figured a quick(ish) summary of what all is going on in Fedora 24 and Rawhide right now might also be of interest to a wider audience.

• So, uh, the executive summary is: stuff’s busted. Lots of stuff is busted. We are aware of this, and fixing it. Hold onto your hats.

Debian Family

=> ↺ February contributions

=> ↺ Free software activities in February 2016

=> ↺ Debian LTS Work February 2016

• This was my tenth month as a Freexian sponsored LTS contributor. I was assigned 8 hours for the month of February.

=> ↺ Debian Ruby Sprint 2016 – day 1

• The day started with a quick setup, with a simple 8-port switch, and a couple of power strips. It tooks us a few minutes to figure what was blocked or not on the corporate network, and almost everyone who needs connections that are usually blocked in such environments already had their VPN setups so we were able to get started right after that.

Derivatives

=> ↺ Debian/TeX Live full update 20160223

• Only one week has passed since the last Debian/TeX Live update, and there is already a new one? The explanation is simple: consolidation of packages and preparation for 2016. The update comprises of uploads of texlive-base, texlive-lang, texlive-extra, texlive-bin, musixtex, pmx, m-tx, xmltex, jadetex. Besides the usual changes it brings a merge back in of several hitherto separately packaged packages.

Canonical/Ubuntu

=> ↺ Anyone Can Now Port Ubuntu Linux for Raspberry Pi 3 with Ubuntu Pi Flavour Maker

• We believe that you already know about the surprise launch of the Raspberry Pi 3 single-board computer today, February 29, 2016, and it appears that developers had early access to the board.

=> ↺ Ubuntu 16.04 LTS Wallpapers Revealed for Desktop and Phone

• The new Ubuntu 16.04 LTS wallpaper has been revealed, and it looks like it’s a small evolution over the previous iteration.

• There was a time when the default wallpaper for new Ubuntu releases was much more exciting, but that is no longer the case. On the other hand, the new wallpapers are getting more complex, and they are usually the product of someone from the design team.

=> ↺ Ubuntu’s Aethercast Work in Progress for Display Casting Now Available

• Meizu MX Pro 5 Ubuntu Edition is launching soon, and developers are preparing the integration of Aethercast, a technology that will allow users to cast the display via Miracast or WiFi Display.

=> ↺ Ubuntu MATE Project Donates over $1,500 to Upstream and Other Devs

• The Ubuntu MATE project has just revealed that they donated over $1,500 (€1,400) to other upstream projects and developers that are helping them in return.

Flavours and Variants

=> ↺ Ubuntu MATE 15.10 Brings Day One Support for Raspberry Pi 3

• Now that Raspberry Pi 3 has officially landed, the first distributions are arriving, and it looks like Ubuntu MATE 15.10 is the first one to provide support.

=> ↺ Elementary boss watches the Linux distro make great strides

• elementary OS is a consumer-focused, open source, Linux-based operating system with a heavy emphasis on UX design. I am the founder of elementary (the company behind elementary OS). A great deal of my time is spent organizing our team, which is mostly made up of volunteers, but I also spend time coding for both web and desktop, triaging bug reports, providing visual and UX design, and of course interacting with our users.

Devices/Embedded

=> ↺ Raspberry Pi 3 on sale now at $35

• Exactly four years ago, on 29 February 2012, we unleashed the original 256MB Raspberry Pi Model B on a largely unsuspecting world. Since then, we’ve shipped over eight million units, including three million units of Raspberry Pi 2, making us the UK’s all-time best-selling computer. The Raspberry Pi Foundation has grown from a handful of volunteers to have over sixty full-time employees, including our new friends from Code Club. We’ve sent a Raspberry Pi to the International Space Station and are training teachers around the world through our Picademy program.

=> ↺ Raspberry Pi 3 has Wi-Fi and Bluetooth, 64-bit chip, still just $35

• The third major version of the Raspberry Pi will go on sale Monday, with the $35/£30 credit card-sized Raspberry Pi 3 Model B now sporting a 64-bit processor and embedded Wi-Fi and Bluetooth.

• In previous versions, the Pi needed USB adapters to get Wi-Fi and Bluetooth connectivity. Raspberry Pi 3 supports 802.11n Wi-Fi (2.4GHz only) and Bluetooth 4.0 without an adapter, freeing up its four USB ports for other purposes.

=> ↺ Raspberry Pi 3 with 64-bit quad-core SoC, built-in Wi-Fi and Bluetooth announced for $35

• Months after introducing its most affordable Raspberry Pi Zero, the company has introduced the Raspberry Pi 3, successor of the Raspberry Pi 2 that was introduced back in February last year. Even though it is in the same size and has much of the same components on board as the Pi 2, the new Pi 3 has a faster 64-bit quad-core Broadcom BCM2837 SoC with ARM Cortex-A53 CPU, has built-in Wi-Fi 802.11n and Bluetooth 4.1.Months after introducing its most affordable Raspberry Pi Zero, the company has introduced the Raspberry Pi 3, successor of the Raspberry Pi 2 that was introduced back in February last year. Even though it is in the same size and has much of the same components on board as the Pi 2, the new Pi 3 has a faster 64-bit quad-core Broadcom BCM2837 SoC with ARM Cortex-A53 CPU, has built-in Wi-Fi 802.11n and Bluetooth 4.1.

=> ↺ Happy Birthday Raspberry Pi — Four Years Of The Best Pi Ever Made

=> ↺ Embedded Linux on a 2-Layer Board!

• For my first shot at creating a fork-ready design, I created Clementine Core — a 454 MHz ARM single-board computer with 64 MB of RAM, designed to boot Linux from a MicroSD card. Clementine Core uses the circa-2009 Freescale i.MX233 application processor, which, while getting a bit crusty, is still widely-available for less than $10/each and is guaranteed to be in production until at least 2019. This processor was selected because of its high level of integration — nothing other than external RAM and flash storage is required for it to boot into a full Linux environment. The i.MX233 also is available in a TQFP package, which allows the design to be laid out on a two-layer PCB and hand-soldered.

=> ↺ Chromium OS Coming Soon to All SBCs, Including the New Raspberry Pi 3 and Zero

=> ↺ Quad-core 64-bit Pi 3 is official with WiFi, BT, and $35 price

• Raspberry Pi Trading launched a $35 Raspberry Pi 3 SBC with a quad-core, 1.2GHz Cortex-A53 Broadcom SoC plus WiFi and Bluetooth.

• In the course of a year, the Raspberry Pi has moved from one of the more retro community-backed SBCs on the market to one of the most cutting edge. A few days after the Raspberry Pi 3 story leaked online, the Raspberry Pi Foundation, Raspberry Pi Trading, and Element14 formally launched the shiny new 64-bit, wireless-enabled Raspberry Pi 3 Model B. The newly 64-bit hacker boards sells for the same price as the $35 Raspberry Pi 2 Model B, which delivered an even larger performance boost compared to the previous version when it launched with a quad-core, 900MHz Cortex-A7 SoC a year ago.

=> ↺ An open-source alternative to Android Wear OS for smartwatches emerges

• Linux-based AsteroidOS for smartwatches is in beta, but it could be a while until it’s a viable alternative

=> ↺ Snap-in Tegra K1 COM tackles vision processing, deep learning

• Toradex’s SODIMM-style “Apalis TK1” module runs Linux on a 2.2GHz quad-core Tegra K1 SoC, and offers extensive I/O including SATA, A/V, USB 3.0, and PCIe.

• The SODIMM-style, 82 x 45mm Apalis TK1 computer-on-module is pin-compatible with Toradex’s earlier Nvidia Tegra 3 based Apalis T30 and i.MX6-based Apalis iMX6 modules. The Apalis TK1 moves up to Nvidia’s Tegra K1 SoC, which here has four of its Cortex-A15 cores clocked to 2.2GHz. A fifth companion Cortex-A15 handles low-power duty. The real draw here, however, is the CUDA-enabled, 192-core Mobile Kepler GPU, which can be used for vision processing, GPU-accelerated parallel processing, and deep learning/machine learning in addition to good old fashioned graphics rendering.

=> ↺ Raspberry/Pi 3? Meh

=> ↺ Raspberry Pi 3 Announced, Shipping With 1.2GHz 64-bit ARM CPU

=> ↺ Raspberry Pi 3 Promises IoT Innovation with Bluetooth and WiFi Support

• The next generation of the Raspberry Pi — the tiny, inexpensive computers popular with Linux and open source fans — is apparently on the way. And in news that could please the IoT market, it will feature integrated wireless and Bluetooth support.

=> ↺ Raspberry Pi 3 Released

=> ↺ Video: Raspberry Pi 3 Announced

=> ↺ New Raspberry Pi 3 Has Wi-Fi, and a 64-Bit Processor

=> ↺ Raspberry Pi 3 Officially Released, Ten Times More Powerful than Original Model

• Raspberry Pi 3 is now available for purchase, and this new single board mini-PC aims to take the world by storm with some amazing hardware specs at the same $35 (€32) price.

=> ↺ It’s Official! The Raspberry Pi 3 Is Here!

• The Raspberry Pi Foundation has officially announced the launch of the Raspberry Pi 3, which is the first Pi to come with built-in wireless capabilities and a 64-bit processor.

• The Pi Podcast was able to get an exclusive interview with Raspberry Pi founder Eben Upton on what exactly is the Raspberry Pi 3 and how it stacks up to the rest of the Raspberry Pi lineup. Here’s the takeaway from the interview.

=> ↺ Raspberry Pi 3 rolls out with faster CPU, on-board Wi-Fi, and Bluetooth

=> ↺ Raspberry Pi 3 Released With Built-in Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, And 50 Percent Faster Processor

=> ↺ Advantech-DLoG’s latest-generation logistics terminals available with IGEL Linux thin client operating system

• IGEL Technology has collaborated with Advantech-DLoG, a specialist for industrial PC and in-vehicle terminal solutions, on its latest generation vehicle terminal series, called the DLT-V72. The rugged industrial PCs are suitable for all types of logistics application and will now be available with the IGEL Linux operating system. As a result, they can be remotely managed quickly and easily using the Universal Management Suite (UMS) management software – free with all IGEL solutions – and dovetail seamlessly into central IT infrastructures.

Phones

Tizen

=> ↺ Samsung Gear Manager updated to version 2.2.16022241 for Tizen Smartwatches

Android

=> ↺ Android Pay to Make Its U.K. Premiere

=> ↺ Android Pay to launch in the UK next month

• Google’s rival to Apple Pay will make its British debut at the end of March, as the web giant attempts to muscle into the emerging mobile payments industry.

=> ↺ Microsoft sneaks onto Android while Android sneaks onto Windows

• A Microsoft-friendly Android OS is coming to market, in the form of Cyanogen OS, and weirdly, and it hasn’t cost Microsoft a penny in equity investment.

=> ↺ Kryptokit Launches Jaxx Bitcoin And Ethereum Wallet For Android Tablets

=> ↺ Android Candy: Quick Games

=> ↺ Ransomware is the biggest threat to Android users in UK

=> ↺ Google screening missed hundreds of malicious Android apps, researchers say

=> ↺ Samsung’s Android flagships get February security update

=> ↺ 5 Android apps you shouldn’t miss this week! – Android Apps Weekly

=> ↺ Apple, Android, BlackBerry phones: Which is more vulnerable to hackers?

=> ↺ Android 6.0 Marshmallow Update Status For Motorola Droid Turbo 2

=> ↺ Samsung Rolling Out Android February Security Updates To Galaxy S6 Series, S5, Note 5 And Note 4

=> ↺ Android N Could See Google Ditching The App Drawer [Update]

=> ↺ Android’s latest commercial has Rock, Paper, and Scissors becoming BFFs

=> ↺ WhatsApp drops support for BlackBerry, Nokia and older Android phones

=> ↺ Facebook Live Video Streaming Coming Soon to Android, More Countries

=> ↺ Samsung Releases February Android Security Update for High-End Galaxy Devices

• Ever since Google promised monthly security updates for its Nexus devices, it has been keeping its promise of releasing Android security update every month. In February, Google rolled out the monthly security update on the first day of the month. BlackBerry followed Google to release the security update for its Priv smartphone at around the same time.

=> ↺ Why Android and even Windows might make it onto the Raspberry Pi 3

• The Pi’s co-creator Eben Upton spoke about the new operating systems the community is working to bring to the Pi 3 and the chances of seeing Android, Chromium OS and maybe even a full version of Windows on the board.

=> ↺ Samsung Galaxy S7 vs LG G5: What’s the best Android phone of 2016?

=> ↺ Best new icon packs for Android (February 2016) #3

=> ↺ Android N appears without an app tray, just like iOS: Fans freak out

=> ↺ Will Google kill the App Drawer in Android N?

=> ↺ Android N images reveal tweaked notification shade

=> ↺ Waze announces updated Android app with complete UI refresh and new features

=> ↺ Google’s New Android Commercial Is an Oscars Hit

=> ↺ Ad of the Day: Oscar Viewers Fall in Love With Android’s Game of Rock, Paper, Scissors

=> ↺ Android N Without An App Drawer? Watch This Google Video And See For Yourself

=> ↺ WhatsApp Beta released to Android

=> ↺ [Exclusive] An Early Look At Android N’s Redesigned Notification Shade And Quick Settings Panel

=> ↺ Android N may remove a key feature and some fans are outraged

=> ↺ Android 6.0 Marshmallow Update Status For Sony Xperia Z5, Z3+, Z4, Z2, M And C Lineup

=> ↺ How to block phone numbers in Android Marshmallow

=> ↺ How to share custom short URLs from your Android

Free Software/Open Source

=> ↺ How to choose the right brand architecture for your open source project

• Most people who start an open source software project aren’t sitting around waiting for someone to discuss brand architecture models with them, but many of them do have long term goals for their project that include eventually seeing it becoming a paid product or even the basis of a company built around servicing and supporting the project code.

=> ↺ Open Source Evolution: From Making Better Code to Making Better Business

• Today, open-source software is thriving in the Cloud, with a whole new generation of projects – such as Docker, Heroku, Open Stack and others. Cumulatively, GNU is still the leading license, but MIT, Apache and other licenses are among the top licenses used in open-source projects.

=> ↺ Top Open Source Creativity Apps

• There is a common belief among non-Linux users that there aren’t any good creative applications from the open source camp. In truth, this is absolutely false. The key is knowing which applications are needed to complete a specific task. In this article, I’ll share my recommendations for the top open source creativity apps.

=> ↺ 6 essential non-coding careers in open source

• When I started working in open source software in 1999, it was a small part of what I did. My company, SGI, wanted to start shipping Linux-based servers, and my task was to create a process for commercializing Linux. Today we’ve reached a point where open source software is in almost every area of technology. And while we often still think of it as code and developers, a whole ecosystem has evolved around open source—one that includes many full-time careers. These roles are much needed as open source matures, and they allow more of us who believe in the power of collaborative development to get involved.

• To help those looking to get involved in open source professionally, here’s a look at some of the most popular and emerging roles.

=> ↺ OPNFV Delivers Second Release of Open Source Network Functions Virtualization Platform

=> ↺ OPNFV puts out second release of open source NFV platform, Brahmaputra

=> ↺ Alluxio: Open Source Tech Making Baidu’s Data Centers Faster

• Running a successful internet business without using the data you accumulate to your advantage is clearly impossible in this day and age. Until about one year ago, Baidu, the web company behind the largest Chinese-language search engine and the country’s answer to Google, had a major technology problem on its hands.

• The queries Baidu product managers ran against its databases took hours to complete because of the huge amount of data stored in the company’s data centers. Baidu needed a solution, and its engineers were given the goal of creating an ad-hoc query engine that would manage petabytes of data and finish queries in 30 seconds or less.

=> ↺ 6 more must-have open source apps for Windows, Mac, and Linux

• In this follow up article, here are some more of the best open source and free apps I’ve found for my heterogeneous environment.

=> ↺ Hortonworks seeks salvation in proprietary software

• Three years ago Hortonworks led a chorus of open source Kumbaya as it sought to differentiate itself in the rapidly growing Hadoop market. Today, Hortonworks has significantly changed its tune, embracing proprietary software as a way to improve its financials.

=> ↺ Documentation should be concise, consistent, and simple

• “Words mean things” is one of my favorite expressions. I often use it in jest, but it’s an important consideration when writing documentation. I’m normally one to sling words around with great artistic flair, but when it comes to writing technical documentation, I’ve become more deliberate in my wording.

Web Browsers

Chrome

=> ↺ Animated PNG Support Is Still Being Blocked From Google’s Chrome Browser

• While Firefox, WebKit, and other browsers / layout engines have supported APNG (Animated PNGs) for some time in hopes of finally unseating GIFs for being a modern animated image file format, it doesn’t look like that will happen with Google’s Chrome/Chromium being among the few still resisting support for that file format.

Mozilla

=> ↺ Firefox OS will Power New Line-up of Panasonic Ultra HD TVs

• Panasonic announced today that Firefox OS will power the new Panasonic DX-series UHD TVs.

• Panasonic TVs powered by Firefox OS are already available globally. These TVs have intuitive and customizable home screens which give you “quick access” to Live TV, Apps and personal connected devices. You can access your favorite channels, apps, videos, websites and content quickly – and you can also pin any app or content to your TV home screen.

=> ↺ New Panasonic UHD TVs to be powered by Firefox OS

=> ↺ Panasonic Embraces Mozilla’s Open Source Firefox OS for More Smart TVs

=> ↺ No folks, Firefox OS is not dead yet

=> ↺ Panasonic sticks with Firefox OS for smart TV range

=> ↺ Panasonic Smart UHD TV DX series sticks to Firefox OS

=> ↺ Panasonic reveals details of Firefox OS-powered UHD TVs

=> ↺ The end of the Iceweasel Age

• For roughly the past decade, Debian has shipped the Mozilla desktop applications (Firefox, Thunderbird, and Seamonkey) in a rebranded form that replaces the original, trademarked names and logos with alternatives (Iceweasel, Icedove, and Iceape). Originally, this effort was undertaken to work around incompatibilities between the Debian Free Software Guidelines (DFSG), the Mozilla trademark-usage policy, and the licenses of the Mozilla logos. But times—and policy wordings—change, and Debian now seems poised to resume calling its packages by the original, upstream Mozilla names.

SaaS/Big Data

=> ↺ Improving Sahara security, changing the summit cadence, and more OpenStack news

Databases

=> ↺ Weekly phpMyAdmin contributions 2016-W08

Oracle/Java/LibreOffice

=> ↺ native gtk3 menubar in libreoffice

• For comparison here’s the (not utterly awful) emulated look prior to this. You can compare the spacing of elements in the menubar, menu separator rendering, distance of checkmarks to the following text, the display of the short cuts in different font attributes with different positioning, and menu entry line spacing.

=> ↺ LibreOffice Now Has GTK3-Native Menus

• There’s even more progress now to report on with LibreOffice’s GTK3 tool-kit support.

• LibreOffice has been making lots of progress with their GTK3 tool-kit support to better integrate the open-source office suite on modern Linux desktops and is also needed for running LibreOffice on Wayland. A few days ago we reported on GTK3 native context menus for LibreOffice while the latest to mention now are native menu bars.

=> ↺ LibreOffice Is Getting GTK3 Native Menus

CMS

=> ↺ Acquia adapting to future needs as web trends change

• The Boston-based open source firm Acquia is dabbling in several technologies to ensure that, down the road, it stays as big a player in the market as it is now.

• Acquia uses the Drupal content management system to build websites for companies around the world and has produced and powered roughly 12 per cent of all Drupal implementations, according to Chris Stone, the head of engineering and chief product officer.

Pseudo-/Semi-Open Source (Openwashing)

=> ↺ Nexenta and Mellanox Partner Around Open Source-Driven Software-Defined Storage; Joint Seminar in Tokyo, Japan

=> ↺ Nexenta to Highlight Trends in Open Source-driven Software-Defined Storage to AGC’s 2016 Information Security and Broader Technology Growth Conference

=> ↺ Cloudwick Announces Open Source Adaptive Security Managed Solution for the Digital Enterprise

Funding

=> ↺ Platform as a Service Leader Apprenda Incorporates Google’s Kubernetes for Cloud-Native Applications

=> ↺ Apprenda pulls another Hail Mary, pivots to Kubernetes

=> ↺ Apprenda joins Google’s open source community

=> ↺ Lisk Raises Over 1200 Bitcoin for Open Source Dapp & Custom Blockchain Platform

• Lisk aims to revolutionize decentralized application and Blockchain technology. Powered by its own crypto-currency LISK, the platform allows developers worldwide to easily deploy their own custom Blockchains, and program decentralized applications on top of them, using the highly accessible programming language JavaScript.

=> ↺ Lisk Raises $500,000 in First Week of ICO

=> ↺ Lisk Raises Over 1200 Bitcoin During the First Week – Open Source Dapp & Custom Blockchain Platform

BSD

=> ↺ Video: 30 Years of Minix

=> ↺ Haiku in 2016

• About once a year I like to put aside Linux distributions, and the various flavours of BSD, to look at Haiku. As the Haiku website tells us, “Haiku is an open source operating system that specifically targets personal computing. Inspired by the BeOS, Haiku is fast, simple to use, easy to learn and yet very powerful.”

FSF/FSFE/GNU/SFLC

=> ↺ The Licensing and Compliance Lab interviews Michael Zahniser of Endless Sky

• This is the latest installment of our Licensing and Compliance Lab’s series on free software developers who choose GNU licenses for their works. In this edition, we conducted an email-based interview with Michael Zahniser of Endless Sky

Public Services/Government

=> ↺ UK open source drive ‘encourages citizens participation’

• The push by the UK government to use more free and open source software for its eGovernment services is helping to get citizens more involved, says Bernard Tyers, a user experience researcher working for the UK’s Home Office. “Everyone can see how the design and research process works, and users are helping to test our prototypes.”

=> ↺ Consultations launched for local authority common digital standard

• The views of council staff and other stakeholders are being sought for a draft Local Government Digital Service Standard devised to encourage use of common services and data registers between different authorities based on a similar approach used in Whitehall.

• With support from the Government Digital Service (GDS), a group of councils working as part of the LocalGov Digital network has been working to finalise guidelines for a common approach to service transformation and design.

=> ↺ Digital service standard set to mandate data reuse

• Last week, PublicTechnology reported that the new Local Government Digital Service Standard emerged from discussions held earlier this month at the offices of the Government Digital Service.

• Publication of the draft standard covering transactional services has been coordinated by digital practitioner network LocalGov Digital, and based on the existing central government standard could be adapted for councils.

=> ↺ Councils urged to use agile, open source and platforms

• LocalGovDigital publishes draft version of Digital Service Standard for local government

Licensing

=> ↺ Is SFLC Shooting Open Source in the Foot?

• The academic article by SFLC about ZFS is troubling and may unintentionally shoot free software licensing in the foot.

• When I was at Sun (as part of the team that released the Java Programming Language by starting the OpenJDK project) I often heard community concerns about the CDDL license. At the time the big complaint was about the “Choice of Venue” clause.

• I got involved because Sun had developed many essential Java libraries and distributed them under CDDL. The community requested a more permissive license and I was able to convince internal project leaders (and Sun’s lawyers) to make a licensing change for a handful of these projects. And there was much rejoicing.

• Based on my experience in helping Java to become open source I came to appreciate the legal hacks on copyright which make open source possible. It’s the free software license which uses copyright to enable sharing (vs. the default of disabling sharing).

=> ↺ The VMware Hearing and the Long Road Ahead

• On last Thursday, Christoph Hellwig and his legal counsel attended a hearing in Hellwig’s VMware case that Conservancy currently funds. Harald Welte, world famous for his GPL enforcement work in the early 2000s, also attended as an observer and wrote an excellent summary. I’d like to highlight a few parts of his summary, in the context of Conservancy’s past litigation experience regarding the GPL.

• First of all, in great contrast to the cases here in the USA, the Court acknowledged fully the level of public interest and importance of the case. Judges who have presided over Conservancy’s GPL enforcement cases USA federal court take all matters before them quite seriously. However, in our hearings, the federal judges preferred to ignore entirely the public policy implications regarding copyleft; they focused only on the copyright infringement and claims related to it. Usually, appeals courts in the USA are the first to broadly consider larger policy questions. There are definitely some advantages to the first Court showing interest in the public policy concerns.

Openness/Sharing

=> ↺ BrewDog’s open-source revolution is at the vanguard of postcapitalism

• Fast forward to now, and a very interesting thing just happened. BrewDog, the Scottish-based brewery whose beer outlets are spreading rapidly across the globe, just open-sourced its recipe collection. In a cheeky press release, its founders quipped: “Oh, and if you are from one of the global beer mega corporations and you are reading this, your computer will spontaneously combust, James Bond style, any second now.”

=> ↺ ‘Platform car’ is driving open-source design

=> ↺ The innovators: Skeleton car that is driving open-source design

• The OSVehicle units consist of parts that can be easily swapped without throwing away other working parts, which expands the vehicle’s lifespan, said Yuki. Its core unit contains the most complex parts of a vehicle, which means it is stable and ready to use, she added. Loddo compares it to the Android operating system for mobile phones, where developers can freely access the software as a base on which to build apps.

Open Hardware

=> ↺ Open Source Hardware is an opportunity for Synthetic Biology research – the DocuBricks approach by Tobias Wenzel

• There is a lesson to be learned from the incompleteness of commercial assembly-set documentations: Open Source Hardware is more than an assembly instruction. It is also about documenting design files and decisions along its functionality and in a modular fashion, complete with testing and calibration instructions. A good documentation enables the project to grow and improve without the doing of the inventor. Only in this way most projects can enfold their benefit well to society and technology companies. To be sure, documenting a hardware project is not easy and requires time. For this reason a handful scientists at the University of Cambridge (including the author), all with a background in technology and biology, recently started the DocuBricks initiative. DocuBricks is an open source and free software that makes documenting hardware and usage procedures easier. The name is a reference to modularity in the same way as Lego or BioBricks. As the name suggests, the editor part of the software guides the user through a modular documentation structure with relevant fields in a standardised, yet general format. The user can create a hierarchy of documentation bricks, explaining their function, implementation and assembly while referring to a parts library. The result is a XML document and a folder with construction and media files that is displayed with the viewer part of the software (a style sheet and script to enable interactivity).

=> ↺ Kicad hacking – Intra-sheet links and ERC

• I spent time looking at gEDA and Eagle when I wanted to get back into hardware hacking for my own ends; but neither did I really click with. On the other hand, a mere 10 minutes with Kicad and I knew I had found the tool I wanted to work with long-term.

=> ↺ Open-Source System 3D Prints from Custom Powders

• An open-source laser sintering printer has been used to print intricate 3D objects from powdered plastics and biomaterials. The system costs a fraction of equivalent commercial systems and could give researchers a DIY technique for working with their own specialized materials.

Programming

=> ↺ If line-noise is a program, all fuzzers are developers

=> ↺ Is Perl the Duct Tape of the Internet? [PODCAST]

• After decades of use, open source Perl remains a popular development language that holds much of the modern Internet together.

Standards/Consortia

=> ↺ Vulkan Bindings For Java Are Also Available Via LWJGL

Leftovers

=> ↺ GitHubber wants to revive the first Unix in a PDP-7 emulator

• An IT lecturer from the Australian state of Queensland wants to revive the very first Unix – the version written by Ken Thompson on a Digital Equipment Corporation PDP-7.

• While the PDP-11 is probably the most famous of the series – a genuine watershed in computer history, and a successful system that sold 600,000 units in its 20-year life on the market – the PDP-7 has its own place in history.

• Its most enduring contribution to the life of the sysadmin: it was the machine that then Bell Labs engineer Ken Thompson wrote the first Unix on, in assembly language, in 1969. As the Linux Information Project notes, it was also DEC’s first system to use a mass-storage-based operating system.

• That’s what Warren Toomey is working to re-create in this project.

Science

=> ↺ Footage of possible meteor in Scotland

• Footage has been recorded of what appears to be a meteor in the sky over Scotland.

• Police received a large number of calls after a big, bright flash was seen.

• People took to social media to report seeing a blue, white or green light, with some saying they also heard a rumbling sound.

• Driving instructor Bill Addison, from Buckie in Moray, recorded what appeared to be a meteor shooting across the sky on his dashboard camera.

• Mike Fleming captured similar footage on the road between Dunecht and Castle Fraser in Aberdeenshire.

• The “flash” was also caught on a security camera at Woodend, Lumphanan, Aberdeenshire, which was sent in by Craig Lindsay.

Health/Nutrition

=> ↺ Thousands of NHS nursing and doctor posts lie vacant

=> ↺ The Rising Threat of Religious Hospitals Denying Women Medical Care

• Imagine you are 20 weeks pregnant, only halfway through your pregnancy, when you start to miscarry. It’s the middle of the night; you call an ambulance and are rushed to the hospital. The hospital admits you and consults with a specialist who concludes that the only option is to induce labor and complete the miscarriage — either way, the fetus will not survive. But without induction of labor you could die too.

• But instead of acting quickly to save your life, the hospital admits you and watches you get sicker and sicker. For 10 hours, the hospital will do nothing to complete the miscarriage, even though the hospital knows that every moment the miscarriage drags on increases your risk of contracting a life-threatening infection, which you ultimately do.

=> ↺ Calls Grow for Wendy’s to Join Fair Food Program as Coalition Plans Major Protest of Fast-Food Giant

• It ensures farmworkers access to shade and water, increased pay, as well as freedom from sexual harassment and forced labor. Although fast-food giants like McDonald’s and Subway have signed Fair Food Agreements, Wendy’s has refused—instead opting for their own “Supplier Code of Conduct,” which activists say is less stringent and has no enforcement mechanisms.

Security

=> ↺ Security updates for Monday

=> ↺ Peer-Seeking Webcam Reveals the Security Dangers of Internet Things

• Last week security blogger Brian Krebs revealed that a popular internet-enabled security camera “secretly and constantly connects into a vast peer-to-peer network run by the Chinese manufacturer of the hardware.”

=> ↺ Joomla Sites Join WordPress As TeslaCrypt Ransomware Target

• Exploit kits infecting thousands of WordPress websites are setting their sights on the open-source content management system Joomla in a new campaign spotted by a researcher at the SANS Institute’s Internet Storm Center.

• “The group behind the WordPress ‘admedia’ campaign is now apparently targeting Joomla sites,” said Brad Duncan, security researcher at Rackspace. “We are starting to see the same traffic characteristics in infections that are associated with Joomla sites – as we did with the WordPress campaign,” Duncan said.

=> ↺ Most software already has a “golden key” backdoor: the system update

• In 2014 when The Washington Post Editorial Board wrote “with all their wizardry, perhaps Apple and Google could invent a kind of secure golden key they would retain and use only when a court has approved a search warrant,” the Internet ridiculed them. Many people painstakingly explained that even if there were somehow wide agreement about who would be the “right” people and governments to hold such an all-powerful capability, it would ultimately be impossible to ensure that such power wouldn’t fall in to the “wrong” hands.

Defence/Police/Secrecy/Aggression

=> ↺ Texas Academics Told to Avoid ‘Sensitive Topics’ to Prevent Angering Armed Students

• Here’s another swanky benefit of our out-of-control gun culture: university professors should be aware that their students might shoot them.

=> ↺ Kerry Phones Serbian PM Over Diplomats Killed in U.S. Libya Strike

• So, those American airstrikes recently in Libya, the ones for freedom and to defeat ISIS and banish Ant Man to hell? Yeah, darn it, they also killed two Serbian diplomats. But don’t worry, America’s own secretary of state John Kerry personally called the Serbian prime minister to say “Sorry, our bad, dude.”

=> ↺ Saudis lobby MEPs before arms embargo vote over Yemen

• Riyadh engaged in concerted effort to persuade European parliament not to pass amendment calling for EU sanctions because of bombing campaign

=> ↺ The Dulles Brothers and Their Legacy of Perpetual War

• I was intrigued by the 2015 release of David Talbot’s The Devil’s Chessboard: Allen Dulles, the CIA, and the Rise of America’s Secret Government. But it also reminded me of a 2014 book I had been wanting to read titled The Brothers: John Foster Dulles, Allen Dulles, and Their Secret World War by Stephen Kinzer. Since the earlier book covered both important brothers — the younger Allen who was Director of Central Intelligence and the elder John Foster who was Secretary of State — I decided to go with Kinzer.

• As it turned out, I was so fascinated by Kinzer’s discussion of the Dulleses that after finishing The Brothers, I dove right into Talbot’s The Devil’s Chessboard. I am so glad that I did. While there is some unavoidable overlap, reading the two books in quick succession is not at all redundant. In fact, they are such splendid complements of each other, that one almost wonders if the two authors coordinated.

Transparency Reporting

=> ↺ Freedom Of Information Act To Remain: Here Are Eight Things We Wouldn’t Have Known Without It

• A decision not to charge for Freedom of Information (FoI) requests has been hailed as a “victory for journalism”.

• The government revealed on Tuesday that there will be no legal changes to the FoI Act after a review of the legislation found it was “working well”.

=> ↺ Freedom of Information charges ruled out after review

• Freedom of Information requests – used by campaigners and journalists to ask questions of public bodies – are to remain free of charge, a minister says.

• Following a review of the law, Cabinet Office minister Matt Hancock said the FoI Act was “working well”.

• The FoI Commission was asked to examine it amid concerns within government that “sensitive information” was being inadequately protected.

• Its report said FoI had helped “change the culture of the public sector”.

• Mr Hancock said there would be no wholesale changes to the FoI Act.

=> ↺ Spain updates compendium of eGovernment rules

• The Spanish government has published an update of its Law on Electronic Administration. Two chapters have been added, on “Transparency and Access to POublic Information” and on “Electronic Judicial Administration”.

Environment/Energy/Wildlife

=> ↺ Coral bleaching in Qld is the ‘worst in 15 years’

• The worst coral bleaching in more than 15 years has hit Lizard Island off far north Queensland, scientists say, prompting fears about other northern parts of the Great Barrier Reef.

• Lyle Vail, who runs the Lizard Island Research Station north of Cairns, said the majority of the reef flat surrounding the island was showing signs of bleaching.

• “We do notice a bit of minor bleaching most summers but this year is exceptional – it’s the worst since 2002 – that year was quite bad,” he said.

Finance

=> ↺ CETA Legal Review Completed, Now Off To Parliaments And Governments For Approval

• The European Union and Canada have jointly announced the finalisation of the legal review for Canada-European Union Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA).

• The agreement, which originally was signed by the negotiators in 2014, was re-negotiated to address strong concerns with regard to the investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS) procedures.

=> ↺ Restaurants Demand State Freeze Servers’ Wage

• As an example, New York state’s hourly minimum wage for tipped workers rose from $5.00 to $7.50 on January 1 (standard, non-tipped, minimum wage is $9.00 an hour in the state), much to the dismay of the New York State Restaurant Association. The restaurant owners lobbying group sent a letter to NY Governor Andrew Cuomo demanding that he freeze the tipped wage for five years. This letter comes just weeks after the National Restaurant Association filed an appeal with the state Supreme Court, claiming that Cuomo’s plan to raise the minimum wage further by 2018 is part of a longstanding pattern of discrimination “against the hard working men and women that own New York’s restaurants.”

=> ↺ WaPo Factcheck Adds Confusion, Not Clarity, on Social Security

• In short, President Bush’s proposal for replacing a portion of the traditional Social Security system did offer a substantial bonanza for Wall Street in a way that was not true of President Clinton’s proposal for investing the trust fund. Secretary Clinton was not wrong to make this distinction, even if some of her comments were not entirely accurate, as Kessler points out.

=> ↺ EU referendum: Peter Mandelson breaks silence to warn over effects of Brexit

• British exporters would face trade tariffs of up to 20 per cent on goods such as cars, whisky, pharmaceuticals and fashion sold around the world if the UK pulled out of the European Union, the former Trade Commissioner Lord Mandelson will warn on Tuesday.

• In his first intervention in the referendum debate, the Labour peer will claim that the UK could not only lose access to the single European market but could also lose the EU’s preferential trading status in foreign markets.

PR/AstroTurf/Lobbying

=> ↺ This terrifying Rupert Murdoch quote is possibly the best reason to stay in the EU yet

• Are you on the fence about Brexit? Do you feel akin to Boris (pre-blatant leadership bid) dithering and mulling your decision over, considering what suits your personal circumstance?

• We think we may have something that’ll sway it for you.

• As you are no doubt aware, although media mogul Rupert Murdoch hasn’t declared which side he stands on in the referendum, there have been a few subtle hints as to his position.

=> ↺ Scalia Dined at the Great Trough of Corruption

• Antonin Scalia was the longest-tenured justice on the current Supreme Court, and a great friend to conservatives in his opinions. It turns out he also ate his share at the great trough of American corruption.

=> ↺ Antonin Scalia: The Billion-Dollar Supreme Court Justice

• Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia was worth billions of dollars to corporate America, if a Dow Chemical settlement made public Friday is any indication.

• Dow was in the midst of appealing a $1.06 billion class-action antitrust ruling, after a jury found that it had conspired with other chemical companies to fix prices for urethane, a material used in furniture and appliances.

• But because of Scalia’s death and the sudden unlikelihood of finding five votes on the Supreme Court to overturn the case, Dow decided to settle for $835 million, the bulk of the original award.

=> ↺ Donald Trump’s Appeal to White Nationalism

• AFTER TWO DECADES of studying the inner workings of extremist groups in the United States, Brian Levin, a professor at California State University in San Bernardino, has developed a routine for attending Ku Klux Klan rallies. He’ll tape an interview or two, collect whatever literature is available, see if he can spot any notable figures, and make a count of the demographics on hand. The aim, Levin says, is to maintain a degree of anonymity. That was the plan Saturday afternoon when he showed up to Pearson Park in Anaheim, California, for a demonstration by the local chapter of a Klan faction known as the Loyal White Knights.

=> ↺ Will it be Trump or Goldman Sachs?

• It’s largely a choice of style, not substance, dirty business as usual continuing no matter who succeeds Obama. Still, Snowden has a point.

• Hillary Clinton, like husband Bill, got super-rich through speechmaking, lucrative book deals and other Big Money handouts.

• Lots came from Wall Street and other corporate supporters – a rogue’s gallery of crony capitalist interests buying influence.

• Her public financial disclosures show she earned $2,935,000 from 12 speeches to Wall Street banks alone from 2013 – 2015, five for $225,000 (her usual fee).

=> ↺ Why Did It Take an Activist to Bring ‘Superpredators’ Into the Campaign?

• The fact that it took Black Lives Matter activist Ashley Williams to bring “superpredators” into 2016 presidential campaign coverage (AlterNet, 2/24/16) truly demonstrates the malfeasance of the corporate press.

=> ↺ Hillary Clinton Still Haunted by Discredited Rhetoric on “Superpredators”

• Hillary Clinton is relying on support from black voters to help her carry South Carolina in the Democratic primary on Saturday, but at a fundraiser in Charleston on Wednesday night, she found herself confronted by a young black activist demanding an apology.

• As video of the protest shows, the activist, Ashley Williams, interrupted Clinton’s remarks about criminal justice at the private event by unfurling a banner with the phrase “we have to bring them to heel.” Those words — language that has been taken as an offensive and racist characterization of young black teens as unruly animals — were used by the former first lady at a campaign rally for Bill Clinton in New Hampshire in January 1996.

Censorship

=> ↺ Fighting the phrase “Polish death camps” with education, not censorship

• However, where a line has to be drawn is when governments threaten to infringe upon the freedom of academic historians. And this appears to be the direction in which Poland’s government is heading, following two announcements made over the last week. Either one on its own would be worrying enough, but taken together they raise the spectre of concerted government interference in historical research.

=> ↺ Ridiculous Censorship

• Self-censorship during the final night of Putri Indonesia pageant show in a private TV station last week is really out of the proportion.

• During the show, the TV station decided to completely blur the torsos of contestants who donned the body-hugging Javanese kebaya dress.

=> ↺ China silences property mogul on social media after criticism of president

• The Chinese government has deleted the popular social media accounts of property mogul Ren Zhiqiang after he publicly criticized President Xi Jinping.

• On Sunday, the Cyberspace Administration of China ordered Chinese technology companies Sina and Tencent to shut down Ren’s microblog accounts on their platforms.

=> ↺ China’s Censorship Clampdown Stirs a Pushback

• A high-profile clash between China’s censors and an influential businessman with a huge social-media following marks a further tightening of a clampdown on public discourse under President Xi Jinping—one that is starting to generate unexpected pushback.

=> ↺ Chinese internet watchdog bans former tycoon Ren Ziqiang’s microblog

=> ↺ China’s ‘Donald Trump’ is latest victim of government crackdown

=> ↺ South Korea Embraces Ridiculous Right To Be Forgotten As Well

• I’m still in a position where I don’t understand this at all. If the information is somehow false or “illegal” I can understand the desire to remove it. But I have a lot more trouble understanding the ability to remove truthful and legal information just because someone doesn’t like it. This kind of system will always be abused to just censor perfectly reasonable and often useful information, just because it exposes something someone doesn’t like. It’s disappointing that South Korea appears to be embracing such a head in the sand approach to information.

=> ↺ White House Asked Google & Facebook To Change Their Algorithms To Fight ISIS; Both Said No

• Earlier this year, we wrote about how ridiculous the federal government’s view of Silicon Valley seemed to be, in that they had this weird belief that by nerding a little harder, we could somehow “disrupt” ISIS. The thinking seemed confused, and somewhat typical of people who don’t understand technology or how Silicon Valley works. It’s “magic wand” thinking. People who don’t understand technology tend to view technology as a sort of magic — and thus, they assume it can do anything. And, right now, a bunch of those people in the White House want that magic wand to make ISIS disappear from the Internet.

• Buzzfeed’s Sheera Frenkel has a great detailed report looking “inside” the administration’s attempt to have Silicon Valley help in the fight against ISIS. The main focus of a (not very secret) meeting held on Wednesday seemed to be entirely about fighting ISIS propaganda with American propaganda. As if that ever works. And, from the sound of it, the meeting was equally clueless about why ISIS propaganda is effective, while American propaganda flops.

=> ↺ Inside The Obama Administration’s Attempt To Bring Tech Companies Into The Fight Against ISIS

• They flew in from New York, San Francisco, and Los Angeles to hole up in a windowless D.C. conference room for nearly five hours on Wednesday — representatives of the country’s top tech and entertainment companies brainstorming with U.S. counterterrorism officials to tackle one tough question: how to stop the spread of ISIS online.

=> ↺ Obama Administration Asked Facebook And Google To Change Their Algorithms To Fight ISIS

• On 24th February, White House invited the biggest names in the tech world to discuss the plans to defeat ISIS online. However, the meeting only reflected the flawed approach of Obama administration that went on to ask Facebook and Google to change their algorithms to hide pro-ISIS stuff.

=> ↺ Chinese censors clamp down on popular online videos

• China’s dour censors have long maintained a lengthy naughty list, and used it to keep the country’s television sets unsullied by anything deemed to “lack positive thoughts and meaning.”

• Now, the Chinese Communist Party under President Xi Jinping has vowed to apply the same rules online, slamming shut an era of looser rules for Internet video, amid a sweeping campaign to reassert strict new controls over the country’s cultural life – a campaign motivated in part by fears that speech must be controlled lest a slowing economy sow dangerous unhappiness.

=> ↺ I Resign: The Writing Center’s Mission is to Teach Writing, Not Ideology

• I wish I could continue to work at the Writing Center because I feel that it’s important for all students, whether black or white, on financial aid or not, conservative or liberal, to have a place to review and strengthen their writing. Unfortunately, the Writing Center no longer seems to be that place. Until the Writing Center can return to its apolitical mission and forsake its acceptance and appeasement of political harassment, I regret that I must resign my position as a Writing Fellow.

=> ↺ Debate is good, but can it be imposed?

• The rise of campus censorship has helped reinvigorate a discussion about free speech across society.

=> ↺ The Latest Hillary Clinton Conspiracy Theory Doesn’t Make Sense

=> ↺ Is Twitter Censoring Hashtags Critical of Hillary Clinton?

=> ↺ Nintendo urged to FIRE feminist employee at centre of furious child pornography censorship row

• In her long essay, Rapp described people who possess child pornography as “simple possessors” or “mere possessors”, even though this is a serious crime.

• Her thesis jumps between discussing child pornography featuring “real children” and fictionalised depictions of sickening acts, meaning it often appears unclear what she is actually discussing.

• However, the content of the essay has provoked a furious response among many of the people who have read it.

• Rapp wrote: “Criminalising the the possession of a type of media – whether violent video games… controversial political or religious texts, or child pornography – is tantamount to criminalising thought, and should be above countries like the U.S. and Japan who have such strong freedom of speech protections.”

Privacy

=> ↺ Snooper’s charter to extend police access to hack phones and access internet data

• Latest version of investigatory powers bill will allow police to hack people’s computers and view browsing history

=> ↺ Sensing Public Support Waning, UK Fast Tracks Snooper’s Charter

• For some time now, we’ve been covering the UK’s plan — led by Home Secretary Theresa May — to pass a new Snooper’s Charter that would increase surveillance powers greatly in the UK. There’s been a growing amount of criticism of the plan in the UK, so rather than respond to it, May has simply moved to fast track the bill, officially called the Investigatory Powers Bill. The bill will officially be “published” today on March 1, and then will likely be voted on before the end of April.

=> ↺ The New EU-US Data Sharing Pact Still Allows Mass Surveillance

• A controversial, over decade-old arrangement used to transfer data of European citizens to US companies such as Facebook appears soon to be replaced: The draft text of the EU-US Privacy Shield, the data regulation pact rushed through to substitute the contentious Safe Harbour agreement, was published on Monday.

• Safe Harbour has faced renewed scrutiny since the 2013 Snowden revelations, and a new agreement has been anticipated for months. But surveillance law experts, as well as Max Schrems, who brought on challenges against Safe Harbour in the first place, say that the EU-US Privacy Shield doesn’t solve key privacy problems, and that it still facilitates mass surveillance.

=> ↺ GCHQ spy back at work after Plenty of Fish date rape claim

• Two women claim police did not believe that a spy working at the UK eavesdropping headquarters GCHQ raped them. The first woman claims the 28-year-old man – who they allege still works for the secretive agency – raped her in 2010 after they struck up a relationship on the matchmaking website Plenty of Fish.

• The second claimant, who also worked for GCHQ, which is in Gloucestershire, said the same man attacked her in 2012. In both cases, the man – who cannot be named for legal reasons – was given a harassment warning.

=> ↺ Encryption still a low priority for too many cloud users

• The vast majority of organisations plan to store confidential or sensitive data in the cloud by 2018, but despite that being just two years away, only a third have already set out an encryption plan which can be described as consistently applied across the entirety of the enterprise.

• According to the 2016 Global Encryption and Key Management Trends Study, more than half of global organisations are already transferring sensitive or confidential information to the cloud, with 56 percent of respondents stating that this already forms part of their data storage strategy, whether or not that data is encrypted or made unreadable via some other mechanism.

=> ↺ Next moves for the IPB: Split, Delay or Publish?

• Last week we heard three parliamentary committees’ criticisms of the Investigatory Powers Bill (IPB). All in all they had 123 recommendations about changes that need to be made to the Bill. So what’s next for this huge surveillance Bill?

=> ↺ The push-me-pull-yous of public policy: surveillance and freedom of information

• Surveillance and freedom of information are the push-me-pull-yous of public policy.

=> ↺ Declassified letter from 2002 defends warrantless taps

• A previously classified letter defending President George W. Bush’s controversial warrantless wiretap program deployed in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 attacks sought to justify the strategy as “the most effective method’’ to defend the country from additional assaults.

=> ↺ 2002 Letter Lays Out Bush’s Legal Authority For Conducting Surveillance After 9/11

=> ↺ Revealed: How The Bush Administration Argued Legal Loopholes for NSA Snooping

=> ↺ Classified 2002 Letter on NSA Eavesdropping Is Made Public

=> ↺ Apple Wins Big: Court Rejects FBI’s Argument For Hacking Drug Dealer’s iPhone

=> ↺ Former CIA Agent Barry Eisler Turned Writer on Imagining/Predicting Gov’t Surveillance

=> ↺ Apple to Court: FBI’s Failure Should Not Force Apple to Undermine Global Security

=> ↺ Voter Privacy: What You Need to Know About Your Digital Trail During the 2016 Election

=> ↺ Judge In Different Apple Case Says That All Writs Act Doesn’t Mean Apple Needs To Help Feds Break Into Phone

=> ↺ Spy continues to work at GCHQ despite rape allegations

• A GCHQ spy accused of rape by two women is still working at the secretive security agency because the police “did not properly investigate” the women’s claims, one of the alleged victims has said.

• The first alleged victim, who met the 28-year-old security officer through the dating website Plenty of Fish in 2010, said police ignored her claims twice, even after a second victim, a woman who worked with him at the GCHQ offices in Gloucestershire, came forward in 2013, the Mirror reports.

=> ↺ ACLU Sounds Alarm As Obama Administration Plans Quiet NSA Expansion

• Civil liberties advocates slammed reports on Friday that the Obama administration is poised to authorize the National Security Agency (NSA) to share more of its private intercepted communications with other U.S. intelligence agencies without expanding privacy protections.

• “Before we allow them to spread that information further in the government, we need to have a serious conversation about how to protect Americans’ information,” Alex Abdo, a staff attorney with the ACLU’s Speech, Privacy and Technology Project, told the New YorkTimes.

• The change would loosen restrictions on access to the communications that are collected in mass data sweeps, including emails and phone calls, the Times reported, citing “officials familiar with the deliberations.”

=> ↺ Apple Wins Major Court Victory Against FBI in a Case Similar to San Bernardino

• Apple scored a major legal victory in its ongoing battle against the FBI on Monday when a federal magistrate judge in New York rejected the U.S. government’s request as part of a drug case to force the company to help it extract data from a locked iPhone. The ruling from U.S. Magistrate Judge James Orenstein was issued as part of the criminal case against Jun Feng, who pleaded guilty in October to drug charges. It is a significant boost to Apple’s well-publicized campaign to resist the FBI’s similar efforts in the case of the San Bernardino killers.

=> ↺ Want To Report A Dangerous Drug Dealer? Just Enter Your Personal Info Into The DEA’s Unsecured Webform

• Chris Soghoian, the ACLU’s chief technologist, has decided to troll the DEA. His complaint is valid, though. The problem is, how do you troll the DEA when it’s almost impossible to find the contact info of the person you want to speak to? Just like the FBI has more options at its disposal than simply demanding Apple help it beat down an iPhone’s front door, Soghoian was able to route around the DEA’s unforthcoming attitude.

=> ↺ FBI Claims It Has No Record Of Why It Deleted Its Recommendation To Encrypt Phones

• Then, last year, I noticed that the page had been deleted. Seemed curious, so I sent in a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) to the FBI to better understand why that page had magically been deleted, just at the time it seemed to contradict the FBI Director’s statements about encryption.

=> ↺ Courts, DOJ: Using Tor Doesn’t Give You A Greater Expectation Of Privacy

• In this month alone, we’ve had two federal judges and the DOJ state that there’s no expectation of privacy in IP addresses. This would normally be something covered by the Third Party Doctrine — where an IP address is part of the records retained by ISPs, and therefore, can be accessed with subpoenas rather than warrants.

• The twist, though, is that all of these statements were made in reference to people who made an active effort to obscure their IP addresses by using Tor.

=> ↺ Privacy Advocates Blast Plan to Expand NSA Data Sharing

• The Obama administration plans to increase the amount of private communications the National Security Agency can share with other government agencies without first adding privacy protections, according to a report published last week in The New York Times.

• The plan would ease restrictions on the amount of intercepted email and telephone intelligence the NSA gathers, including bulk collection of satellite communications, phone data between foreigners, and messages from overseas that U.S. allies provide, according to the report, which cited unnamed officials familiar with the deliberations.

• The move represents a major expansion of surveillance and data sharing authority and has been a longstanding concern of privacy groups, according to Marc Rotenberg, president of the Electronic Privacy Information Center.

• “There are significant privacy implications that EPIC will examine in detail,” he told the E-Commerce Times.

=> ↺ CIA And NSA Directors Blame The Media For Terrorists Using Encryption

• When it comes to the conversation that’s going on about the use of encryption, CIA director John Brennan and NSA Deputy Director Rick Ledgett have acquitted themselves rather poorly on a regular basis. It’s been an ongoing source of frustration to see the aftermath of the Paris terrorist attacks in particular devolve into a discussion on encryption, despite all evidence suggesting that those attacks weren’t planned using any kind of encryption at all. That didn’t keep Brennan from claiming that the CIA was unable to keep attacks from occurring due to encryption, nor has it stopped the calls from intelligence officials for even more data collection, despite the fact that those same officials have proven to be soft targets for hackers themselves. Ledgett, meanwhile, has proven to be an adversary of the free press, cheering on the destruction of computers from The Guardian.

=> ↺ European Pact Legalizes Facebook, Google, Amazon Data Transfers

• Privacy advocates railed Monday after the European Union unveiled a 128-page framework for trans-Atlantic data transfers that, the advocates said, amounts to little more than “10 layers of lipstick on a pig.” The document outlines the specifics of the EU-U.S. Privacy Shield, which replaces the 15-year-old Safe Harbor agreement struck down in October in a case that pitted Austrian grad student Max Schrems against Facebook[ticker symb=FB]. Schrems alleged Facebook misused Europeans’ data in cooperation with a National Security Agency program. Facebook has denied the allegation. U.S. spying tactics fell under scrutiny in 2013 after former NSA contractor Edward Snowden released thousands of classified documents allegedly detailing mass surveillance by the government.

=> ↺ ‘Privacy shield’ – the new deal governing how Europe’s user data is sent to the US

=> ↺ Privacy Shield doomed from get-go? NSA bulk surveillance waved through

• The European Commission has published details of its transatlantic “Privacy Shield” agreement, which is designed to ensure that personal information of citizens is protected to EU standards when it is sent to the US—even though it would appear that the NSA will continue to carry out bulk collection of data under the new pact.

• The new deal replaces the earlier Safe Harbour framework, which was struck down by the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) following a complaint by privacy activist Max Schrems.

• An accompanying Privacy Shield FAQ released by Brussels’ officials explained that there are four main elements. According to the commission, the new agreement will “contain effective supervision mechanisms to ensure that companies respect their obligations, including sanctions or exclusion if they do not comply.”

=> ↺ System Updates: Governments Can Hack Most Software Using This “Golden Key” Backdoor

• When you read the headlines like “FBI is forcing Apple to create a backdoor in their products”, what you are really reading is that the FBI is forcing iPhone-maker to use the “pre-existing software update backdoor” present in iPhones. Surprisingly, a backdoor already exists in most software in the form of system updates and the US government is looking to exploit the same.

=> ↺ Leaked! Details Of The New Congressional Commission To Take On The Encryption Issue

• Back in December, we wrote about plans by Rep. Mike McCaul and Senator Mark Warner to put together a “commission” to figure out what to do about the encryption “issue.” In his speech, McCaul did at least say that “providing a backdoor into everybody’s iPhone was not going to be a very good strategy” since it would open things up to hackers, but at the very same time, he kept saying that we had to somehow stop bad people (terrorists, criminals, child predators) from using encryption. He also keeps insisting that the Paris attackers used encryption, despite lots of evidence to the contrary. So it’s not entirely clear what the point of this Commission is, other than to chase down some mythical solution that doesn’t exist.

• The basic problem is this: to have real security you need strong encryption. And if you have strong encryption, people who are both good and bad can use it. So either you undermine strong encryption for everyone — harming the vast majority of good people out there — or you allow strong encryption, meaning that some bad people can use it. The only way to have strong encryption but not allow the bad guys to use it is to have a technology distinguish who is “bad” from who is “good.” I’m pretty sure that’s impossible because there’s no universal standard for what makes a “bad” or “good” person, and definitely not one that can be implemented in device hardware or software. So a commission seems like a waste of time.

=> ↺ NSA Spying, Privacy and the Fourth Amendment: The Views of U.S. Presidential Candidates

• Sanders, who voted against the Patriot Act and the U.S.A. Freedom Act, stated in a Time article last year: “Do we really want to live in a country where the NSA gathers data on virtually every single phone call in the United States – including as many as 5 billion cellphone records per day? I don’t.”

• Arguing against the U.S.A. Freedom Act in 2015, Sanders wrote: “Do we really want our government to collect our emails, see our text messages, know everyone’s Internet browsing history, monitor bank and credit card transactions, keep tabs on people’s social networks? I don’t.”

• “The Intercept” (theintercept.com) funded by billionaire Pierre Omidyar teamed with Glenn Greenwald, Laura Poitras, and former Nation writer Jeremy Scahill, has become the custodian of Snowden’s immense archive of classified documents, which it continues to mine for stories.

• Edward Snowden is living in asylum in Russia and currently in negotiations with the U.S. Justice Department. In February, he told a libertarian forum he will return home if he is guaranteed a “fair trial” and “can make a public interest defense of why this was done and allow a jury to decide.”

=> ↺ The Most Important Passages From Apple’s Challenge to the FBI

• GovtOS. That’s what Apple Inc. calls the newest product in its pipeline. It’s not the brainchild of the gadget masters in Cupertino but rather an iPhone operating system conceived by some buttoned-down folks in Washington, D.C. Unlike the latest iPhone or iPad, it wasn’t revealed on a stage before thousands of the faithful. Instead, it was unveiled in a stark response to the Obama administration’s attempt to force the computer maker to assist in a terrorism probe. And, Apple has warned, it may someday lead to every American being made an unwilling assistant to law enforcement.

=> ↺ ‘I’d move heaven and Earth’ to access Lavrov’s emails – former head of NSA and CIA

• Privacy seems less and less attainable these days, as foreign spy agencies target top political figures. The former director of both the NSA and CIA told US Today that he’d “move heaven and Earth” to access Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov’s email.

• Retired four-star general Michael Hayden, the only person who has ever served as both the director of the NSA and CIA, made the comments while criticizing former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s use of a private server for emails.

=> ↺ Spy who used Plenty of Fish dating site is accused of rape by two women but is still working for GCHQ because ‘police did not take their claims seriously’

• A spy accused of rape by two women, including one he met on dating website Plenty of Fish, is still working at GCHQ amid allegations police did ‘not take their claims seriously’.

• Both alleged victims say police ignored their claims about the national security expert, who is still working at the top secret intelligence headquarters in Gloucestershire.

• Details of the case emerged in a civil court hearing in which it was revealed that the worker had once been dismissed by GCHQ managers after child porn was discovered on his computer.

=> ↺ Spy accused of rape still working for GCHQ because ‘police did not properly investigate’ claims, alleged victim says

• A secret service official accused of rape by two different women he has had relationships with is described him as ‘untouchable’

Civil Rights

=> ↺ Panel: Poland’s constitutional crisis endangers democracy

• An international human rights commission says a crisis affecting the functioning of Poland’s Constitutional Tribunal has endangered the rule of law, democracy and human rights.

=> ↺ Council of Europe criticises Poland’s court changes – report

• The Council of Europe’s advisory body has said reforms of Poland’s constitutional court pose a danger to the rule of law in the European Union member state, dealing another blow to the eurosceptic Warsaw government’s legal changes.

• Poland asked the Council’s Venice Commission to comment on the legal changes after parliament overruled appointments made to the tribunal by the previous government, causing uncertainty over its proceedings.

=> ↺ Police Shoot 17-Year-Old Teenager For Refusing To Drop Broomstick

• On Saturday night, two Salt Lake City officers shot a black teenager in his torso because he refused orders to drop his weapon — a broomstick. The shooting, which left the teen in critical condition, led to clashes between protesters and police.

• The Salt Lake City Police Department says the shooting occurred when two officers saw two men, including 17-year-old Abdi Mohamed, attacking another man with metal objects. In the officers’ version of events, Mohamed refused to drop his weapon and moved to attack the victim, prompting the officers to open fire.

=> ↺ Virginia Senate Committee Approves Bill to Withhold Public Employee Information

• The legislation was passed by the General Laws and Technology Committee whose rationale was to protect the private information of public employees from possible hackers.

=> ↺ Virginia Senate Votes To Exempt Police Officers’ Information From FOIA Responses

• Way to go, Virginia. In a time when police accountability is (finally!) a mainstream media topic, the Virginia state legislature is having none of it.

=> ↺ Federal Judge Says Third Party Doctrine A Perfectly ‘Good Law;’ No Warrants Needed To Obtain Cell Location Records

• Back in December, a Connecticut state court ruled that tracking people in near-real time with cell site location info required the use of a warrant. Three months later, a Connecticut federal court has ruled law enforcement can obtain CSLI without a warrant, in bulk and for extended periods of time. While the opinion doesn’t address the use of subpoenas and CSLI as a makeshift Stingray (for real-time tracking), it does come down firmly on the side of the government’s interpretation of the Third Party Doctrine.

=> ↺ Freed from Detention in Bahrain, U.S. Journalist Describes Interrogation & Ongoing Crackdown

• We continue our exclusive interview with one of four U.S. journalists who were detained in the Gulf state of Bahrain and released Sunday after an international outcry. Anna Therese Day and her camera crew were in Bahrain during protests marking the anniversary of the kingdom’s February 2011 uprising. She describes their interrogation and the ongoing crackdown on journalists and human rights advocates in Bahrain.

=> ↺ Only In America: An Indiscreet Selfie Can Put A Kid In Prison

• Did you know that if you are an American under 18 years old and you use your cell phone to send a nude “selfie” of yourself to a friend, you can be convicted of manufacturing and distributing “child pornography” and sent to prison? In case you are too old to be in the loop, a “selfie” is a photo that one makes of oneself.

• This is how expansively prosecutors, whose main purpose in life is to ruin as many people as possible, interpret laws passed to protect children from sexual exploitation.

=> ↺ When Immigration Detention Becomes a Death Sentence

• New report shows ICE is not holding immigration detention facilities accountable for medical neglect.

• On an April morning in 2012, at about 5:24 a.m., a guard inside the Denver Contract Detention Facility initiated a Code Blue emergency because he saw a detainee in medical distress. Minutes later, nursing staff arrived and found 46-year-old Evalin-Ali Mandza lying on the bed in his cell, holding his chest, and complaining of severe chest pain. He was having a heart attack.

• Denver Contract Detention Facility (DCDF) is one of approximately 250 detention facilities around the country that hold immigrants with pending deportation proceedings. It is operated by GEO Group, Inc. — a private prison company with annual revenues of nearly $1.7 billion — under a contract with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), the federal agency responsible for detaining and deporting undocumented immigrants.

• After moving Mr. Mandza out of his cell, a nurse attempted to take an electrocardiogram. However, she was unable to get a reading because she had not been trained on the EKG machine and did not know how to use it. She then performed the wrong test. Once the nurse performed the correct test, she was unable to interpret the results because she had not been trained on this either.

=> ↺ Victory! State Department Will Try to Fix Wassenaar Arrangement

• Regular readers of this blog will likely be familiar with the Wassenaar Arrangement, a 41-nation agreement intended to regulate the export of certain “dual-use” technologies, such as guns and fissile material. In December 2013, the list of controlled technologies was amended to include surveillance systems for the first time and the participating countries have slowly been rolling out their implementations ever since. Today, news outlets in Washington DC are reporting that the State Department has finally agreed to try to renegotiate the language of the Wassenaar Arrangement to eliminate the 2013 changes.

DRM

=> ↺ Digital Rights Management Faces “Big Data,” Multiple-Rightsholder Challenges

• Managing copyright in digital musical works can be difficult because there are multiple rights holders and no standards for exchanging the massive amounts of data involved. Digital rights management services LyricFind and Rumblefish are among organisations working to streamline access to online content, company chiefs say.

Intellectual Monopolies

=> ↺ UNITAID Report On Delinking R&D Costs From Medicines Prices

• Delinkage of research and development costs from medicines prices could “vastly expand” access to medicines by drastically dropping costs of the knowledge component of health products, innovative medicines R&D facility UNITAID says in a new report.

• The report, entitled: “An economic perspective on delinking the cost of R&D from the price of medicines,” [pdf] was published on 26 February. The report summary from UNITAID is available here.

=> ↺ Re:Route – A Ready Reckoner Of Alternative R&D Models For Health

• The student-driven project, funded by Open Society Foundations, is a qualitative review of the alternative R&D initiatives around the world, in time for the United Nations High Level Panel on Access to Medicines dialogue next month.

Copyrights

=> ↺ Microsoft Sues Pirating Comcast Subscriber

• Microsoft has filed a complaint at a federal court in Washington accusing a Comcast subscriber of activating various pirated copies of its software. The account was identified by Microsoft’s in-house cyberforensics team which logs suspicious “activation patterns.”

=> ↺ Pirate radio playlist

• One of the UK’s most interesting historical legacies in music does not involve the actual bands that made up the British Invasion, but rather the people who played these band’s records illegally.

=> ↺ FBI Busts Movie Industry Insider for DVD Screener Leaks

• A 31-year old man from Lancaster has been arrested following an FBI investigation into several leaked DVD-screeners. The man, who worked in the entertainment industry, pleaded guilty to uploading screener copies of The Revenant and The Peanuts Movie to the private BitTorrent tracker Pass The Popcorn.

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