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● 08.06.23

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● Leftover Links 06/08/2023: India’s Laptop and Tablet Import Ban Postponed

Posted in News Roundup at 8:37 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

Leftovers

=> ↺ teleSUR ☛ Normal Life Far From Reach After Earthquakes in Türkiye: IFRC

• Over 50 percent of families supported by the IFRC and Turkish Red Crescent are taking on new debts after the earthquakes as the country battles inflation.

=> ↺ El País ☛ From Vinyl to USB: The evolution of Mexico City’s ‘sonideros’

• The sonidero scene of the Mexican capital came into conflict in February, when Sandra Cuevas, the mayor of the borough of Cuauhtemoc, banned the small pop-up “dance clubs” that for years had brought together the residents of the Santa Maria la Ribera neighborhood. The politician stated that her decision had been motivated by “many noise complaints from neighbors,” and proposed that they be relocated to enclosed spaces. Meanwhile, the complaints that the Legal Department of Mexico City received for “noise” between January and December 2022 amounted to three.

• One month later, Cuevas turned the situation around by recognizing the sonideros as “cultural heritage” and sharing a photo of her with 20 of their representatives holding the title. Afterwards, the secretary of culture of Mexico City, Claudia Curiel, stated that the declaration of heritage required a long process that involved authorities and specialists, and that it could only be offered by the head of government. “It’s not just handing out a diploma,” said Curiel.

=> ↺ Hackaday ☛ Browser-Based Robot Dog Simulator In ~800 Lines Of Code

• [Sergii] has been learning about robot simulation and wrote up a basic simulator for a robodog platform: the Unitree A1. It only took about 800 lines of code to do so, which probably makes it a good place to start if one is headed in a similar direction.

Science

=> ↺ Science Alert ☛ How 2 Teens Accidentally Solved Charles Darwin’s Most Vexing Problem

• It is now clear that complex plants once flourished before the Cambrian explosion. And yet it’s still unknown why diversity suddenly exploded more than 500 million years ago.

=> ↺ Hackaday ☛ Making A Kid-Scale Apollo 11 Lunar Lander

• If you’d like to see what goes into making a 1/3-scale Apollo 11 Lunar Module, [Plasanator]’s photos and build details will show off how he constructed one for a kid’s event that was a hit!

Education

=> ↺ El País ☛ ‘Young people don’t read because the phone is a much more affordable form of leisure’

• Q. In the book, you are very critical of social networks.

• A. My students’ concentration has dropped tremendously with smartphones. We touch the mobile close to a thousand times a day and communicate with others about 150 times. With the mobile on the table, you act like a person with a much lower IQ. Many children who shine academically practice ballet or music, which require a lot of concentration. Kids are often very aware that they don’t remember short videos they’ve watched or that they get nervous if there’s no change in activity. They watch shows, and even listen to music, at 1.5x speed, because they are unable to keep up. No one listens to an entire song, they always hit the little button first. That shreds their attention spans.

Hardware

=> ↺ Ruben Schade ☛ Supporting (very!) legacy systems

• (I’m AFK today, so I tidied up a half-baked blog post from perennial drafts folder. It’s still not really fleshed out the way I’d usually like, but maybe there’s something there).

• When a tired IT worker suggests someone turns it off, then on again, it’s because it’s shocking how often this works. Any functional programmer worth her salt will tell you how bad state is, and sometimes things enter a weird, unknown, or unplanned state that a simple reboot can clear and fix.

=> ↺ IT Wire ☛ After protests, India delays laptop, tablet import ban by three months

• The Indian Government has delayed its move on immediately banning importers of laptops, tablets and some kinds of PCs, giving the industry three months to wind up these practices, following a backlash against an order on Thursday that said the ban would take immediate effect.

=> ↺ Tom’s Hardware ☛ Intel Plans Massive Fab Expansion in Oregon

• Intel has submitted a permit application outlining plans to build a fourth model of its D1X R&D facility and rebuild its decades-old D1A R&D fab.

=> ↺ New York Times ☛ The Chip Titan Whose Life’s Work Is at the Center of a Tech Cold War

• The insight that Mr. Chang gained from the textbook was deceptively simple: the idea that microchips, which act as the brains of computers, could be designed in one place but manufactured somewhere else. The notion went against the semiconductor industry’s standard practice at the time.

• So at the age of 54, when many people begin thinking more about retirement, Mr. Chang instead put himself on a path to turn his insight into a reality. The engineer left his adopted country, the United States, and moved to Taiwan where he founded Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, or TSMC. The company does not design chips, but it has become the world’s biggest manufacturer of cutting-edge microprocessors for customers including Apple and Nvidia.

=> ↺ Tom’s Hardware ☛ Apple Finishes Dumping Intel Entirely, Touts Results

• The launch of Apple’s Mac Pro based on its M2 Ultra processor formally marked the completion of the company’s transition from Intel’s CPUs to its own system-on-chips, which took about three years. The transition spurred users of Macs to upgrade and encouraged users of Windows to switch to Macs. Roughly half of Apple’s PCs bought in Q2 were purchased by new users.

=> ↺ Hackaday ☛ DIY Eye Tracking For VR Headsets, From A To Z

• Eye tracking is a useful feature in social virtual reality (VR) spaces because it really enhances presence and communication when one’s avatar has a realistic gaze. Most headsets lack this feature, but EyeTrackVR has a completely open source solution ready for anyone willing to put it together.

=> ↺ Hackaday ☛ Prepare To Brake: Quick Intro To Metal Bending

• If you want to bend metal to make shapes, you might use equipment like a brake. But if you don’t have one, no worries. You can still do a lot with common tools like a vise and torches. [Bwrussell] shows you how. He welds together a die to use as a bending jig and makes a set of table legs.

=> ↺ Hackaday ☛ LK-99: Diamagnetc Semiconductor, Not Superconductor?

• Every so often, along comes a story which, like [Fox Mulder] with his unexplained phenomena, we want to believe. EM drives and cold fusion for example would be the coolest of the cool if they worked, but sadly they crumbled when subjected to scientific inquiry outside the labs of their originators. The jury’s still out on the latest example, a claimed room-temperature superconductor, but it’s starting to seem that it might instead be a diamagnetic semiconductor.

=> ↺ Axios ☛ Scientists race to replicate high-stakes claim of a new superconductor

• A team of scientists claimed to develop a material that could act as a superconductor at room temperature — a holy grail of physics that researchers around the world are now trying to replicate.

• Why it matters: Superconductors that can operate at room temperature and ambient pressure hold promise for quantum computing, a more efficient energy grid, producing energy from fusion and more innovation.

Health/Nutrition/Agriculture

=> ↺ Quartz ☛ China is proposing a two-hour limit on children’s smartphone use

• The Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC) proposed a rule that would limit smartphone use for people under the age of 18 on Wednesday (August 2), the latest step by Chinese regulators to curb young people’s internet use.

=> ↺ Hong Kong Free Press ☛ Under 18s in China to have smartphone, internet use curbed every evening

• Chinese children and teens will be cut off from accessing the internet at night and have their smartphone use curbed under new rules unveiled Wednesday aimed at fighting internet addiction.

=> ↺ The Straits Times ☛ China looks to limit children to two hours a day on their phones

• Providers of smart devices will be required to bar users under 18 from accessing the internet from 10pm to 6am.

=> ↺ India Times ☛ China wants children to spend less time on smartphones, might mandate “minor mode”

• The country’s internet regulator this week proposed regulations that if adopted as written would require smartphones, apps and app stores to build a “minor mode” into their products. The aim is to restrict how long children can spend on their phones and what content they can read or watch.

• The proposal, which is open for public comment, would expand the Chinese government’s efforts to regulate aspects of children’s online activity that it has deemed to be negative influences, experts said.

=> ↺ Jacobin Magazine ☛ The Company Whose Chemicals Poisoned East Palestine Still Opposes Rail Safety Legislation

• In February, a train derailment exposed the town of East Palestine, Ohio, to toxic vinyl chloride. Since then, the company that made the chemicals has spent millions to stop railway legislation that could help prevent another disaster.

=> ↺ Science Alert ☛ Sex Toys Shed Hormone-Disrupting Chemicals With Unknown Effects

• While it is too early to say how dangerous these chemicals are, the fact that they haven’t been safety tested for our most intimate body parts is worrisome.

• “Some of the phthalates identified in our experiments have been observed concurrently with serious fertility complications or loss of fertility in rodents at high concentrations,” the authors of the study write, “though causation may not have been demonstrated, the correlation is concerning enough to warrant further investigation.”

=> ↺ New Yorker ☛ The Hidden Harms of CPR

• For decades, physicians have debated whether CPR should be offered to people who suffer from the final blows of incurable illness, be it heart failure, advanced cancer, or dementia. Although CPR has become synonymous with medical heroism, nearly eighty-five per cent of those who receive it in a hospital die, their last moments marked by pain and chaos. The pandemic only deepened the risks: every chest compression spewed contagious particles into the air, and intubation, which often follows compressions, exposed doctors to virus-laden saliva. Hospitals in Michigan and Georgia reported that no COVID patient survived the procedure. An old question acquired new urgency: Why was CPR a default treatment, even for people as sick as Ernesto?

Proprietary/Artificial Intelligence (AI)

=> ↺ New York Times ☛ So What Do We Call Twitter Now Anyway?

• Some people have wondered if the X name will stick, especially with the word tweets still appearing on the site. The app’s home button is also still shaped like a birdhouse, and the company’s website — at least for now — remains Twitter.com.

• So is the Twitter name retired? And do we now call a tweet a “xeet” or “xcerpt”?

=> ↺ Hackaday ☛ Break Free From Proprietary Digital Radio

• Digital modes are all the rage these days in amateur radio — hams are using protocols like WSPR to check propagation patterns, FT8 to get quick contacts on many bands with relatively low power, and MSK144 to quickly bounce a signal off of a meteor. There’s also digital voice, which has a number of perks over analog including improved audio quality. However, the major downside of most digital voice modes, at least those in use on UHF and VHF, is that they are proprietary with various radio brands having competing digital standards. To get above the noise a more open standard can be used instead.

Windows TCO

=> ↺ Security Week ☛ Microsoft Criticized Over Handling of Critical Power Platform Vulnerability

• In March, researchers at vulnerability management company Tenable discovered a critical vulnerability in Microsoft’s Power Platform. The platform, which can be connected to Microsoft 365, Azure and other apps, enables organizations to analyze data, build applications and automate processes.

• The security hole was caused by “insufficient access control to Azure Function hosts, which are launched as part of the creation and operation of custom connectors in Microsoft’s Power Platform”.

Security

=> ↺ LinuxSecurity ☛ Vim Code Execution, DoS Vulns Fixed

• Several denial of service (DoS) and code execution vulnerabilities have been discovered in the Vim enhanced vi editor.

=> ↺ Security Week ☛ Microsoft Criticized Over Handling of Critical Power Platform Vulnerability

• A critical Microsoft Power Platform vulnerability exposed authentication data and other secrets, but the tech giant has been accused of handling it poorly.

=> ↺ Security Week ☛ Google Awards Over $60,000 for V8 Vulnerabilities Patched With Chrome 115 Update [Ed: Better headline: Chrome is full of holes, so Google changes the news cycle to make it sound serious about security and very generous]

• Google has paid out over $60,000 for three high-severity type confusion vulnerabilities in Chrome’s V8 engine.

=> ↺ Security Week ☛ Points.com Vulnerabilities Allowed Customer Data Theft, Rewards Program Hacking

• Multiple vulnerabilities in the airline and hotel rewards platform points.com could have led to personal information theft and unauthorized administrative access.

=> ↺ Pen Test Partners ☛ n00b’s guide to DEF CON. Surviving the Matrix of the underground

• Ah, DEF CON, the world’s largest hacker convention, a beacon for the diverse spectrum of cybersecurity enthusiasts.

=> ↺ Pen Test Partners ☛ PTP at DEF CON 31 2023

• Come and see us at the Aerospace Village, at Caesars Forum. Aerospace Village Fri 11th to Sun 13th Activity Take off in an A320 with hacked engine performance calculator.

=> ↺ Security Week ☛ Decommissioned Medical Infusion Pumps Expose Wi-Fi Configuration Data

• Medical infusion pumps available via secondary market sources contain Wi-Fi configuration settings from the original organization.

=> ↺ Security Week ☛ Dozens of RCE Vulnerabilities Impact Milesight Industrial Router

• Cisco Talos researchers warn of dozens of critical- and high-severity vulnerabilities in the Milesight UR32L industrial router leading to code execution.

=> ↺ Hackaday ☛ Jailbreaking Tesla Infotainment Systems

• With newer cars being computers on wheels, some manufacturers are using software to put features behind a paywall or thwarting DIY repairs. Industrious hackers security researchers have taken it upon themselves to set these features free by hacking a Tesla infotainment system. (via Electrek)

=> ↺ Tom’s Hardware ☛ Unpatchable AMD Chip Flaw Unlocks Paid Tesla Feature Upgrades

• Researchers have uncovered a way to unlock Tesla’s paid upgrades.

=> ↺ Security Week ☛ Threat Actors Abuse Cloudflare Tunnel for Persistent Access, Data Theft

• Threat actors have been observed abusing the open source Cloudflare Tunnel tool Cloudflared to maintain stealthy, persistent access to compromised systems.

=> ↺ LinuxSecurity ☛ Critical OpenSSH RCE Bugs Fixed

• Two critical remote code execution (RCE) vulnerabilities have been found in OpenSSH (CVE-2023-28531 and CVE-2023-38408). Because these bugs are simple to exploit and pose a severe threat to impacted systems’ confidentiality, integrity, and availability, they have received a National Vulnerability Database base score of 9.8 out of 10 (”Critical” severity).

Privacy/Surveillance

=> ↺ Quartz ☛ The right to pay anonymously has become part of an EU culture war

• Karl Nehammer, Austria’s chancellor, announced plans to enshrine the right to pay with cash into the country’s constitution on Friday (August 4), as card contactless payments become more popular in Europe.

=> ↺ Ruben Schade ☛ Cory Doctorow on privacy

• Posted this morning

• They’re disguising a demand as an observation.

=> ↺ Stacey on IoT ☛ Smart home startup Tuo is betting on Matter. Should it?

• This story originally ran on Friday, July 28, 2023 in my weekly IoT newsletter. You can sign up for the newsletter here.  This week, I’ve been testing an attractive smart button from a new company called Tuo.

=> ↺ Scoop News Group ☛ Children’s online safety bills clear Senate hurdle despite strong civil liberties pushback

• Critics say the bills will make the internet less safe for kids by increasing digital surveillance and reducing access to encrypted services.

=> ↺ Techdirt ☛ Large EU Internet Retailer Whines That It Shouldn’t Have To Comply With The DSA’s Most Stringent Rules

• A few months ago, when the EU designated 17 companies as “VLOPs” — Very Large Online Providers — subject to the most stringent regulations, one name that I heard lots of folks in the US be confused about was Zalando, which is a large EU-focused online retailer. It was also one of only two companies actually based in the EU to be designated as such (Booking.com was the other). And it seems that Zalando was just as surprised as everyone else, as it has now sued to challenge that designation.

=> ↺ Techdirt ☛ DC Circuit Says FOSTA Is Perfectly Constitutional, Nothing To See Here

• Back in January there was some hope that the panel of judges hearing the latest version of the challenge to FOSTA’s constitutionality had recognized the problems with the law. That’s because during oral arguments they seemed to express skepticism about its constitutionality, noting that it appeared to criminalize any efforts to legalize prostitution.

=> ↺ Quartz ☛ The right to pay anonymously has become part of an EU culture war

• Karl Nehammer, Austria’s chancellor, announced plans to enshrine the right to pay with cash into the country’s constitution on Friday (August 4), as card contactless payments become more popular in Europe.

=> ↺ Reason ☛ Online Privacy at Risk from Awful U.K. Internet Regulation Bill

• “The Online Safety Bill, now at the final stage before passage in the House of Lords, gives the British government the ability to force backdoors into messaging services, which will destroy end-to-end encryption,” the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) warned last week. “If it passes, the Online Safety Bill will be a huge step backwards for global privacy, and democracy itself. Requiring government-approved software in peoples’ messaging services is an awful precedent. If the Online Safety Bill becomes British law, the damage it causes won’t stop at the borders of the U.K.”

=> ↺ The Verge ☛ Kenya suspends Sam Altman’s eyeball-scanning [cryptocurrency] project

• Kenya isn’t the only country looking into the potential risks associated with Worldcoin. Regulators in France, Germany, and the UK are also evaluating the project and whether it may violate privacy protections. Despite this, Worldcoin maintains that “biometric data never leaves the orb” and is “permanently deleted” after you sign up. The company instead saves your IrisCode — a unique set of numbers that represents your identity.

=> ↺ Interesting Engineering ☛ China’s top SUV maker to add ChatGPT-like bot into cars

• Marking the entry of AI systems into mass-market cars, Chinese automaker Great Wall Motor (GWM) is set to integrate Baidu’s ChatGPT-like AI system, which enables conversation between driver and car.

=> ↺ The Register UK ☛ Google offers to alert netizens when their personal info shows up in Search

• In the interest of privacy – something of an issue at the Mountain View, California-based ad giant – the Chocolate Factory has upgraded its Results About You tool, introduced last year as a way to help people remove personally identifiable information from Google Search results.

• Essentially, you can get alerted when your personal contact information turns up in search results, and tell Google to not show that.

=> ↺ Ruben Schade ☛ We noticed a new login to your …!

• Alert fatigue is a well-understood psychological phenomena where we discount, tune out, or ignore information when we’re overwhelmed by it, thereby defeating the entire point of the alerts. I’d say IT security professionals forget the human element at their peril, though its the rest of us that pay the price.

=> ↺ El País ☛ Why Sam Altman wants to scan two billion eyes

• There’s another problem. The consent form (that nobody reads) says that the spheres also take high-resolution images of the user’s face, eyes and body, in addition to recording vital signs, such as heart rate and breathing. The French and German data protection authorities see signs of infringement of the European General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and have jointly launched an investigation.

Defence/Aggression

=> ↺ Hindustan Times ☛ Hiroshima attack: 78th anniversary of US atomic bombing today. All you need to know

• The Japanese city of Hiroshima, the victim of the searing heat of the world’s first nuclear attack, observed the 78th anniversary of the US atomic bombing on Sunday. Marking the day, Hiroshima mayor urged the abolition of nuclear weapons while the country’s Prime Minister Fumio Kishida warned that the road to a world without nuclear weapons was getting steeper amid looming threats due to growing geopolitical differences.

=> ↺ US News And World Report ☛ Hiroshima Marks A-Bomb Anniversary, Calls Nuclear Deterrence ‘Folly’

• The bomb dropped on Hiroshima on Aug. 6, nicknamed “Little Boy”, killed thousands instantly and about 140,000 by the end of the year. Japan surrendered on Aug. 15.

=> ↺ Gannett ☛ The world inches closer to feared global warming ‘tipping points’: 5 disastrous scenarios

=> ↺ The Register UK ☛ Two US Navy sailors charged with giving Chinese spies secret military info

• Two US Navy service members appeared in federal court Thursday accused of espionage and stealing sensitive military information for China in separate cases.

• Jinchao Wei, aka Patrick Wei, and Wenheng Zhao, aka Thomas Zhao, each pleaded not guilty. According to US prosecutors at his hearing in southern California, Wei allegedly told a fellow sailor he was being recruited by Beijing for what he described as “quite obviously fucking espionage.”

=> ↺ India Times ☛ TikTok unveils new measures ahead of EU Digital Services Act

• Under the EU’s Digital Services Act (DSA), TikTok’s owner ByteDance, Alphabet unit Google, other large online platforms will be required to police illegal content on their platforms, prohibit certain advertising practices, and share data with authorities.

• But after TikTok agreed to a voluntary “stress test” last month, EU industry chief Thierry Breton said “more work” was needed for the firm to be fully compliant.

=> ↺ El País ☛ Social media influencer Kai Cenat faces charges of inciting riot after thousands cause mayhem in NYC

• Social media influencer Kai Cenat is facing charges of inciting a riot and promoting an unlawful gathering in New York City, after the online streamer drew thousands of his followers, many of them teenagers, with promises of giving away electronics, including a new PlayStation. The event produced chaos, with dozens of people arrested — some jumping atop vehicles, hurling bottles and throwing punches.

• Cenat was released early Saturday from police custody after being issued a desk appearance ticket, which is issued by police to require a suspect to appear in court to answer charges. A police spokesperson said he is to appear in court on Aug. 18.

=> ↺ New Statesman ☛ Putin’s secret navy: A small group of Western businesses holds back EU sanctions, and keeps money flowing into Russia’s war machine.

• The uncomfortable fact, Brooks tells me, is that “Russia depends on Western transport infrastructure to keep its war going”.

=> ↺ Digital First Media ☛ Another Michigan clerk says he was asked to provide access to voting equipment

• Vorva, a former GOP state lawmaker, told The Detroit News that he received multiple calls from former state Sen. Patrick Colbeck, a Republican from Canton Township, in late 2020 or early 2021 about analyzing Plymouth Township’s election equipment. Under Michigan law and guidance from the Secretary of State’s office, only certain authorized individuals are allowed to obtain tabulators, policies that are meant to keep the technology secure.

=> ↺ The Gray Zone ☛ From Chi-Town bagman to ECOWAS chairman: meet the former money launderer leading the push to invade Niger

=> ↺ teleSUR ☛ AUKUS Nuclear Submarine Deal Poses Risk to Global Security

• Rooted in a U.S. model of “great power competition,” the AUKUS deal prompts a nuclear submarine arms race.

=> ↺ RFERL ☛ Three Alleged Members Of Ultra-Nationalist Group Arrested In Kyrgyzstan

• Kyrgyzstan’s State Committee of National Security (UKMK) said on August 3 that three alleged members of an ultra-nationalist group had been placed in pretrial detention for at least two months on hatred charges.

=> ↺ Hong Kong Free Press ☛ US raises security, environmental concerns over Chinese reclamation in Manila Bay

• US diplomats have raised security and environmental concerns with the Philippines over the involvement of a Chinese company in a land reclamation project in Manila Bay, a US embassy spokesman said Wednesday. A subsidiary of China Communications Construction Co, which was blacklisted by Washington in 2020, has been contracted to reclaim 318 hectares (786 acres) […]

War in Ukraine

=> ↺ LRT ☛ Matter of time until Lithuania closes Belarus border, says MP

• It’s “a matter of time” until Lithuania closes its border with Belarus, said Laurynas Kasčiūnas, head of the parliamentary Committee on National Security and Defense (NSGK).

=> ↺ Meduza ☛ Ukraine declares waters of Russia’s Black Sea ports as military threat zones — Meduza

• Ukraine has declared the waters of six Russian ports on the Black Sea to be zones of military threat, according to a warning issued on August 4, writes Economichna Pravda. This warning applies to the internal and external waters of the Russian ports of Anapa, Novorossiysk, Gelendzhik, Tuapse, Sochi, and Taman.

=> ↺ Meduza ☛ Russian tanker damaged in overnight naval drone attack — Meduza

• The Russian tanker SIG was damaged by a naval drone attack while approaching the Kerch Strait, according to Russia’s Federal Agency for Maritime and River Transportation. The agency said the attack occurred on August 4 at 11:20 p.m. local time. The ship’s crew was not injured in the attack and the ship remains afloat, says the agency.

=> ↺ Meduza ☛ Russia says fighter jet dispatched in response to U.S. reconnaissance drone detected near border — Meduza

• Russia’s Defense Ministry reported that it dispatched a Su-30 fighter jet after detecting a drone flying over the Black Sea approaching the Russian border.

=> ↺ Meduza ☛ Saudi Arabia hosts Ukraine peace talks, Russia not invited — Meduza

• On August 5, Saudi Arabia began hosting two-day peace talks on Russia’s war against Ukraine, reports Reuters. The Saudi government channel Al-Ekhbariya also announced the beginning of the talks.

=> ↺ Scheerpost ☛ Seymour Hersh: The Senate Armed Services Committee Bombs

• A hearing for the next chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff exposes a bipartisan consensus: culture war is a higher priority than debate about the war in Ukraine.

=> ↺ France24 ☛ 🔴 Live: Ukraine says it downed scores of cruise missiles, drones overnight

• Ukraine’s air force said Sunday it shot down 30 out of the 40 cruise missiles and all the Iranian-made Shahed drones that Russia launched overnight in several waves of attacks.

=> ↺ France24 ☛ Saudi Arabia hosts peace talks on Ukraine war excluding Russia

• Saudi Arabia hosted talks on the Ukraine war Saturday in the latest flexing of its diplomatic muscle, a session that Kyiv had predicted would “not be easy” given the wide range of countries represented.

=> ↺ France24 ☛ Deadly Russian strike hits blood transfusion centre, says Zelensky

• Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky Saturday said Russian forces struck a blood transfusion centre in northeast Ukraine. The news came shortly after a Russian missile attack reportedly hit an aeronautics manufacturing facility in western Ukraine. Earlier, Ukrainian drones in the Kerch Strait hit a Russian tanker, briefly halting traffic on the strategic bridge linking Crimea to Russia’s mainland.

=> ↺ RFERL ☛ Slovakia Allows Nine Citizens To Join Ukrainian Military

• Slovak President Zuzana Caputova has granted permission for nine Slovak citizens to serve in the Ukrainian armed forces fighting off an invasion from neighboring Russia.

=> ↺ RFERL ☛ Moscow Again Closes Major Airport, As Ukraine Reports Massive Overnight Air Strikes

• For the second time in the last week, Moscow’s Vnukovo airport was temporarily closed on August 6 after Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin reported that a drone strike on the Russian capital had been parried.

=> ↺ RFERL ☛ Zelenskiy Urges Saudi Summit Attendees To Ensure ‘Rules-Based’ International Order

• From afar, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy in his nightly video address called on global representatives gathered in Saudi Araba for a summit on the Ukraine war to ensure that rules-based international order be maintained, even in the face of disagreements over other world affairs.

=> ↺ RFERL ☛ Russian Forces Hit Ukrainian Blood Center, Aeronautics Firm, After Second Russian Ship Damaged

• Russian forces struck a blood-transfusion center in eastern Ukraine and other missiles blasted aerospace firm Motor Sich’s facility in western Ukraine, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said, hours after two Russian ships were damaged in explosions in apparent drone attacks in the Kerch Strait.

=> ↺ The Straits Times ☛ Hiroshima marks atomic bombing anniversary, calls nuclear deterrence ‘folly’

• Russia has raised the spectre of using nuclear weapons in its war with Ukraine.

=> ↺ New York Times ☛ Putin’s Forever War

• Vladimir Putin wants to lead Russians into a civilizational conflict with the West far larger than Ukraine. Will they follow him?

=> ↺ New York Times ☛ Ukraine War Expands Beyond Old Battlefields

• Russia has turned to regular attacks on the Black Sea, a vital economic hub, while Ukraine has grown bolder, with strikes hitting Moscow and Russian ships.

=> ↺ New York Times ☛ Pope Francis Declines to Condemn Russia at Fatima Shrine in Portugal

• “It’s not enough just to listen — he has to do something,” said Dmytro Bohak, one of about 500 young Ukrainian pilgrims who attended the event and staged a demonstration.

=> ↺ New York Times ☛ Battle at Sea Intensifies as Ukraine Drone Hits 2nd Russian Ship in 2 Days

• In addition to the strike on an oil tanker, Ukraine issued a warning that commercial ships using any of six Russian Black Sea ports would be considered military targets.

=> ↺ Federal News Network ☛ Pilgrims brave scorching heat for pope’s vigil in Lisbon after Francis ditches Fatima peace prayer

• An estimated 1.5 million young people filled a field in the Portuguese capital for Pope Francis’ World Youth Day vigil. They’ve braved scorching heat to secure a spot for the evening prayer and to camp out overnight so they can be in place for his final farewell Mass on Sunday morning. Temperatures soared to 38 degrees Celsius on Saturday (95 F) in Lisbon and were forecast to top 40 C (104 F) on Sunday. The heat forced the pilgrims to shelter under umbrellas and makeshift shades of plastic canvas sheets tied between trash bins in the otherwise exposed field. Francis was presiding over the evening vigil, after spending the morning at the Catholic shrine in Fatima.

=> ↺ France24 ☛ Russian court sentences opposition figure Navalny to 19 more years in prison

• A Russian court convicted imprisoned opposition leader Alexei Navalny of extremism charges and sentenced him to 19 years in prison Friday. Navalny is already serving a nine-year term on a variety of charges that he says were politically motivated.

=> ↺ RFERL ☛ Navalny Prison Term To Total 19 Years, Mediazona Analysis Of Court Audio Indicates

• Independent Russian media outlet Mediazona says the latest sentence handed down to jailed opposition leader Aleksei Navalny will include his previous sentence, meaning he is scheduled to serve a total of 19 years in Russia’s harshest prison regime after being found guilty on charges of extremism.

=> ↺ RFERL ☛ U.K. Says G7 Oil-Price Cap Is Hurting Russian Revenue

• The price cap on Russian oil imposed by the G7 and other countries continues to eat away at Moscow’s energy revenues, according to the British government.

=> ↺ RFERL ☛ China’s Embassy Criticizes Treatment Of Citizens At Russian Border

• China’s embassy in Moscow has criticized the treatment of five Chinese citizens who were refused entry into Russia, calling the treatment inconsistent with the overall friendly relations between the two countries.

=> ↺ New York Times ☛ Jolted by a Mutiny, Putin Works the Crowds

• His contained interactions with crowds this summer are a noticeable change for the Russian leader, who disdains retail politics and operated in extreme seclusion during the pandemic.

Environment

=> ↺ Futurism ☛ It’s So Hot That Decades-Old Cactuses Are Toppling Over in Defeat

• “Since 2020, we have had elevated mortality in our population of saguaros compared to mortality rates pre-2020,” Kimberlie McCue, chief science officer at the Desert Botanical Garden, told the AP. “So part of our thinking is that there are still saguaros today that were compromised from what they went through in 2020. And that this could be sending them over the edge.”

=> ↺ Omicron Limited ☛ Net zero: Direct costs of climate policies aren’t a major barrier to public support, research reveals

• Our research also shows that the UK public is broadly on board with net zero, including measures that would involve lifestyle changes. With the market research company Ipsos, we polled more than 5,000 people across the UK on their attitudes to a range of net zero policies. Our findings indicated high levels of public support (in both 2021 and 2022) for most of them, with support strongest for frequent flyer levies, changing product prices to reflect environmental impacts, phasing out gas boilers, and electric vehicle subsidies.

=> ↺ Science Alert ☛ Nuclear War Would Be Worse For Our Climate Than Predicted in The Cold War

• Climate modelling shows the reduced sunlight would plunge global temperatures by up to 10˚C for nearly a decade. These freezing conditions, combined with less sunlight for plants to photosynthesize, would have catastrophic consequences for global food production and lead to mass starvation worldwide.

• Modern climate models are much more sophisticated than those used in the 1980s. And while there are fewer nukes in working order today, more recent results from computer simulations suggest that the grim prophecy delivered by scientists 40 years ago may actually have been an underestimate.

=> ↺ Hong Kong Free Press ☛ Natural disasters in China caused 147 deaths or disappearances in July

• China said Friday that natural disasters had caused 147 deaths or disappearances in July, after the heaviest rains since records began hit the country’s capital at the end of the month. China has been hit hard by extreme weather in recent months, from record-breaking heatwaves to deadly rain.

=> ↺ RFA ☛ China plan to flood villages to spare Beijing sparks clashes in Hebei province

• Residents guard local levees for fear officials will inundate their homes in the middle of the night.

Energy/Transportation

=> ↺ The Atlantic ☛ Would You Drive an Extra Five Minutes to Save the Planet? [Ed: How much energy does it take to manufacture and run those gadgets?]

• Google Maps’ eco-routing feature wants to help me conserve two teaspoons of gas.

=> ↺ New York Times ☛ Rishi Sunak Home Scaled by Greenpeace Protesters in Britain

• The incursion by opponents of oil drilling raised concerns about the security of the British leader and his family.

=> ↺ Security Week ☛ New York Couple Plead Guilty to Bitcoin Laundering

• A married couple from New York dubbed “Bitcoin Bonnie and Crypto Clyde” pleaded guilty to laundering billions of dollars in stolen bitcoin.

Wildlife/Nature

=> ↺ The Straits Times ☛ India’s changes to forest conservation laws could be more harmful than helpful, experts warn

• The amendments meant to aid the country in tackling climate change could instead drastically increase deforestation.

=> ↺ New York Times ☛ Chinese Zoo: This Is a Real Sun Bear, Not a Costume

• “Some people think I look too human when I stand up,” the Hangzhou Zoo’s statement said, after a video prompted internet conspiracy theories. “I am a Malayan sun bear!”

=> ↺ Hong Kong Free Press ☛ Hong Kong vows to review conservation laws as official rejects claim gov’t was slow to respond to whale sighting

• The Hong Kong government has vowed to review existing laws to grant greater powers to the conservation department in managing rare animal sightings.

Finance

Axios ☛ Doctors say insurers are ignoring orders to pay surprise billing disputesInsurers are sometimes ignoring rulings to pay providers, or failing to pay them in full, under the arbitration system established by the new federal surprise billing law, providers tell Axios.Why it matters: The No Surprises Act, a bipartisan effort to limit unexpected out-of-network medical bills, required that insurers and providers undergo an independent arbitration process to settle their differences without involving patients. The complaints from providers are the latest snag with the arbitration system that launched last year. Providers have previously complained the system has been so bogged down by disputes that they have to wait months to get through the arbitration process to get reimbursed.Now, some providers say the feds need to better enforce the law to make sure insurers honor arbitrator rulings.

=> ↺ The Straits Times ☛ Tiny ‘window’ in Shanghai attic space put up for rent draws ridicule, debate over accommodation cost

• The window is about the size of a hand, and is part of an 8 sq m room.

=> ↺ Michael West Media ☛ Huge fines on table as tax avoidance crackdown ramps up

• Tax advisors who help their clients avoid Australian laws could be subject to hundreds of millions of dollars in penalties as part of the biggest crackdown on misconduct in the nation’s history. 

• Strengthening regulator powers and integrity in the tax system will also be part of a Commonwealth push to restore public confidence.

=> ↺ A timeline of some of the major layoffs to hit Canadians in the past year

• While Canada has not officially entered a recession, thousands of workers who have been laid off in the last year might say they feel differently. On Friday, Telus became the latest corporation to announce plans that it will slash its workforce.

• The news adds to an eventful year for workers as Canadians grapple with a high cost of living. Workers across sectors — including the federal government and B.C. ports — have gone on strike to demand better wages and better pay.

• Here’s a look back at some of the biggest layoffs that have hit Canadians over the last year.

=> ↺ Discord cutting 4% of staff as part of restructuring

• Discord is trimming its headcount as the voice, video, and text app reorganizes some of its business units.

• According to news outlets, including Business Insider, the company has laid off nearly 40 employees, or four per cent of its total workforce.

• The cuts have affected staff on Discord’s marketing, design, and entertainment partnership teams.

• “[We] are ensuring that those impacted are being supported,” a company spokesperson told the publication.

=> ↺ The Sunday Times UK ☛ Accenture: tech’s silent partner cuts deep in Ireland

• The tech sector slowdown has led Accenture to axe 900 staff. How did the former Andersen Consulting become such a significant employer in Ireland?

=> ↺ Increase in expenses of state institutions outpaces inflation rate in Turkey

• The expenditures of ministries and other state institutions more than doubled in the first half of the year compared to the same period in 2022, shows an official report.

=> ↺ Helsinki Times ☛ Inflation picked up pace in Finland in July

• Statistics Finland on Monday reported that its harmonised consumer price index crept up by 0.3 per cent between June and July, translating to a year-on-year increase of 4.2 per cent in July. Prices rose last month particularly for culture and recreation-related products and services, by 8.6 per cent from the previous year.

=> ↺ Axios ☛ Hollywood strikes cost cities and states billions

• As Hollywood writers and actors strikes stretch on, states and local businesses are suffering billions of dollars’ worth of losses amid the halt in production.

• Why it matters: Film and TV production hubs like California, New York and Georgia now face massive budget losses even as they content with the problems of high inflation and rising cost of living.

• State of play: California Gov. Gavin Newsom last month signed a $310.8 billion state budget that covered a nearly $32 billion deficit while extending tax credits for film and TV productions.

=> ↺ MIT Technology Review ☛ What’s next for China’s digital currency?

• China’s digital yuan was seemingly born out of a desire to centralize a payment system dominated by the tech companies Alibaba and Tencent. According to its central bank, the digital currency, also known as the e-CNY, is both a risk-free alternative to these commercial platforms and a replacement for physical cash, which is becoming obsolete.

• Almost three years into the pilot, though, it seems the government is still struggling to find compelling applications for it, and adoption has been minimal. Now the goal may be shifting, or at least broadening. China appears to be charging ahead with plans to use the e-CNY outside its borders, for international trade.

=> ↺ Increase in expenditures of state institutions outpaces inflation rate

• The expenditures of ministries and other state institutions more than doubled in the first half of the year compared to the same period in 2022, shows an official report.

=> ↺ WhichUK ☛ Life insurance: is your cover still enough after two years of high inflation?

• NFU Mutual warns that a £100,000 policy bought 20 years ago is worth less than half that today

=> ↺ Axios ☛ The heat wave is driving up gas prices

• Gas prices ticked up 15 cents in just the past week, as the heat wave hitting Texas and Louisiana slowed oil refineries down.

• /blockquote>

=> ↺ İstanbul sees highest monthly surge in retail prices since April 2022

• The price increase was nearly 10 percent in July, with the city’s annual inflation rate exceeding 63 percent, according to the İstanbul Chamber of Commerce.

=> ↺ Latvia ☛ Health insurance quality in Latvia decreases with inflation

• Despite rising prices, demand for health-insurance policies is stable and even with slightly upward rates. However, policy coverage is falling, so either there are fewer services paid for, or customers’ co-payments increase, Latvian Radio reported on July 31.

=> ↺ teleSUR ☛ US Dollar Falls After Federal Reserve Rate Hike Decision

• Nevertheless, the U.S. inflation remains well above the central bank’s target of two percent.

=> ↺ CS Monitor ☛ Inflation battle: Federal Reserve hikes interest rate for 11th time

• For the 11th time in the past 17 months, the Federal Reserve has hiked its benchmark interest rate – this time from 5.1% to 5.3% – in an effort to curb inflation. The Fed gave no clear signs, however, of when or whether there will be further increases.

=> ↺ Turkey’s Central Bank raises year-end inflation forecast from 22% to 58%

• The inflation rate for food prices is projected to reach 61 at the end of the year, according to the governor of the bank.

AstroTurf/Lobbying/Politics

=> ↺ India Times ☛ Former Microsoft India president Anant Maheshwari to lead Honeywell’s high growth region portfolio

• US-based technology conglomerate Honeywell said on Friday that former Microsoft India president Anant Maheshwari has been appointed president and CEO of Honeywell’s high growth region portfolio, effective September 4, 2023. He will succeed Ben Driggs, who will be taking another leadership role in the company. Maheshwari will be a corporate officer of the company, reporting directly to Honeywell CEO Vimal Kapur and will be located in Dubai, United Arab Emirates.

=> ↺ France24 ☛ Sextape scandal reveals the ‘double life’ of Iran’s ultra-conservative authorities

• Social networks in Iran have been flooded with compromising footage featuring several known ultra-conservative officials engaging in homosexual activities. While homosexuality is punishable by death in Iran, the Iranian regime has attempted to deny the videos and cover up the scandals. We spoke to a former religious authority who says authorities are trying to “save face” by refuting the wave of videos.

• Homosexuality is illegal in Iran, and punishable by imprisonment, abuse, fines, or execution.

=> ↺ CBC ☛ Telus slashing 6,000 jobs amid drop in 2nd quarter profits

• The cuts involve 4,000 positions at its main Telus business and 2,000 at Telus International and include offers of early retirement and voluntary departure packages, the Vancouver-based company said Friday.

=> ↺ Federal News Network ☛ Trump boasts at Alabama fundraiser that he needs ‘one more indictment to close out this election’

• Former President Donald Trump has delivered a speech full of defiance and bluster just a day after his third appearance in court as a criminal defendant. At an Alabama Republican Party dinner Friday night, he insulted prosecutors and declared that the charges he faces only help his 2024 presidential campaign. Trump says, “Any time they file an indictment, we go way up in the polls.” He says one more indictment will help him “close out this election.” Trump pleaded not guilty on Thursday to crimes related to his efforts to overturn the results of his 2020 election loss.

=> ↺ NYPost ☛ Trump calls indictments poll-boosting ‘badges of honor’ in first speech since Jan. 6 charges

• Former President Donald Trump declared Friday that the growing list of charges he faces have only helped his campaign and said he considers each indictment a “truly great badge of honor.” Trump, 77, appeared unphased about his legal troubles as he delivered a speech at the annual Alabama GOP dinner in Montgomery, just one day…

=> ↺ LRT ☛ Lithuanian PM voices confidence in defence minister

• Lithuanian Prime Minister Ingrida Šimonytė has voiced her confidence in Defence Minister Arvydas Anusauskas after he came under fire for publishing allegedly restricted-use information on Facebook.

=> ↺ Breach Media ☛ A Meta alternative could serve the public instead of private interests

• As Mark Zuckerberg’s platforms block Canadian news, it’s time to consider how to build alternative platforms that serve the public interest

=> ↺ LRT ☛ Sovereigns – what’s behind the anti-state movement in Lithuania?

• In July, two parents took their children from a care home and attempted to flee to Belarus before they were arrested on August 1. According to Lithuania’s intelligence service, the State Security Department (VSD), the family had identified themselves as “the so-called sovereigns”.

=> ↺ New York Times ☛ Texas Judge Says Doctors Can Use ‘Good Faith Judgment’ in Providing Abortions

• The ruling sought to clarify the medical exceptions in the state’s bans, and was in a response to a lawsuit from women who were denied abortions despite medical emergencies.

=> ↺ Atlantic Council ☛ Global China Newsletter: Don’t believe the (friendshoring/derisking) hype

• The August 2023 edition of the Global China newsletter.

=> ↺ New York Times ☛ How Jack Smith Structured the Trump Election Indictment to Reduce Risks

• The special counsel layered varied charges atop the same facts, while sidestepping a free-speech question by not charging incitement.

=> ↺ Hong Kong Free Press ☛ Foreign forces helped inspire Hong Kong’s mass protests starting 20 years ago, says security chief

• Foreign forces helped fuel a mass protest in Hong Kong back in 2003 as a “trial run” and have continued to threaten national security on several occasions over the past two decades, according to the city’s security chief.

=> ↺ RFA ☛ Hong Kong police question family of Elmer Yuen amid plan for parliament-in-exile

• Yuen’s ex-wife, son and daughter are taken in for questioning by national security police, reports say.

=> ↺ Hong Kong Free Press ☛ Hong Kong national security police question more family members of exiled democrat Elmer Yuen – reports

• Hong Kong national security police have taken away for questioning the ex-wife, daughter and son of one of the eight overseas-based activists for whom HK$1 million bounties have been offered, local media reported citing sources on Thursday.

=> ↺ JURIST ☛ Hong Kong police investigate family of pro-democracy activist wanted for National Security Law violations

• Hong Kong’s national security police reportedly took away and questioned the ex-wife and two children of Elmer Yuan Gong-yi on Thursday. Yuan, who has fled Hong Kong, is a pro-democracy activist wanted by Hong Kong authorities as a fugitive accused of violating the National Security Law.

=> ↺ Scoop News Group ☛ CISA’s strategic plan adheres to overall Biden administration direction on cybersecurity

• The plan outlines major goals and nine objectives the agency has for the next three years to make improvements to U.S. digital defenses.

=> ↺ Hong Kong Free Press ☛ Hong Kong national security police question exiled democrat Elmer Yuen’s ex-wife and son – reports

• Hong Kong national security police have taken away for questioning the ex-wife and son of one of the eight overseas-based activists for whom HK$1 million bounties have been offered, local media reported citing sources on Thursday.

=> ↺ Hong Kong Free Press ☛ Chinese security ministry attempts to mobilise the masses to fight espionage with new social media account

• The entire Chinese nation should join the country’s anti-espionage campaign, to build a “line of civil defence against espionage,” and to safeguard national security, the Ministry of State Security has said on a newly launched social media account.

Misinformation/Disinformation/Propaganda

=> ↺ El País ☛ Russia’s war with Ukraine has generated its own disinformation fog

• Disinformation, misinformation and absent information all cloud civilians’ understanding. Officials from each side denounce devious plots being prepared by the enemy, which never materialize. They claim victories that can’t be confirmed — and stay quiet about defeats.

• None of this is unique to the Russia-Ukraine conflict. Any nation at war bends the truth — to boost morale on the home front, to rally support from its allies, to try to persuade its detractors to change their stance.

Censorship/Free Speech

=> ↺ RFA ☛ Two years after prison release, Hoa Hao follower arrested again in Vietnam

• Nguyen Hoang Nam is accused of Facebook posts that oppose the government and undermine religious unity.

=> ↺ RFA ☛ Hong Kong police plan to arrest Danish artist, hold trial in mainland China: report

• Police decline to confirm if Tiananmen massacre sculptor Jens Galschiøt is wanted by national security department.

=> ↺ JURIST ☛ India state under curfew and internet access suspension after religious violence

• People living in parts of the northern Indian state of Haryana remained under a government-imposed curfew with suspended mobile internet services on Tuesday because of ongoing violence between members of the local Hindu and Muslim communities.

=> ↺ Futurism ☛ Facebook AI Accuses AI Researcher of Being a Terrorist

• At this point, AI chatbots tendency to hallucinate — in other words, completely make up — facts and citations is well-established. And to be clear, these hallucinations are never a benign thing. They’re often convincing, even when they couldn’t be further from the truth.

• But while some AI lies are relatively minor, others are awfully serious, especially when it comes to accusing people of doing very bad things that they definitely didn’t do. Case in point: Meta’s Blenderbot3 accusing Stanford AI researcher Marietje Schaake of being a terrorist.

=> ↺ Meduza ☛ Apple has removed Meduza’s flagship news podcast ‘What Happened’ from Apple Podcasts, without explaining the reason: Earlier this summer, the Russian state censorship authority had asked Apple to block the show

• Although the notice says nothing about the reasons for removing “What Happened,” earlier this summer Meduza learned about a complaint submitted to Apple by the Russian state censorship authority Roskomnadzor (RKN). Claiming that Meduza had violated the law, RKN demanded that Apple remove “What Happened” from its servers.

=> ↺ El País ☛ Censorship just isn’t what it used to be

• This was in my mind during a recent trip through the southern United States, as I saw the forces of censorship blossom all around once more. It seems different, though; censorship is not what it used to be. The United States, which for many years took freedom of expression further than any other modern democracy, is today a contradictory society, mired in implausible culture wars, where forms of censorship that not long ago would have seemed impossible, or that we would have deemed impossible under the much bragged about First Amendment, appear to be in better shape than ever. I heard that in South Carolina a student complained about the memoir of Ta-Nehisi Coates on the grounds that it made him feel ashamed of being Caucasian: the school’s response was to ban the book. A Tennessee college banned Art Spiegelman’s graphic novel Maus, accusing it of including sexually explicit material, because there is a panel showing a drawing of a naked woman in the bathtub. The fact that the woman had just killed herself didn’t help.

Freedom of Information / Freedom of the Press

=> ↺ Press Gazette ☛ Mail on Sunday set for libel trial showdown with mother of boxer Nicola Adams

• Denver Adams is suing Associated Newspapers over an interview with her Olympic boxer daughter.

=> ↺ CPJ ☛ Ukrainian journalist Volodymyr Sedov assaulted after investigating crime

• Sedov, editor-in-chief of the newspaper Visti Ananivshchyna, told CPJ that unidentified people attacked him from behind in a park near his home in the southern city of Ananiv on July 12, knocked him unconscious and trampled on his right hand, breaking two of his fingers.

=> ↺ RFERL ☛ Two Iranian Journalists Covering Women’s World Cup In Australia Seek Asylum

• Two Iranian journalists covering the women’s soccer World Cup in Australia do not plan to return to their home country and will seek asylum abroad, Iran-based online portal Eslahat News reported on August 5. [...]

Civil Rights/Policing

=> ↺ The Atlantic ☛ A Strike Scripted by Netflix

• The writers are trying to roll back changes that the streaming service already made a new normal.

=> ↺ France24 ☛ Arrests highlight the growing ‘criminalisation’ of LGBT+ people in Venezuela

• Thirty-three men were arrested in a popular spot among the LGBT+ community in Valencia, Venezuela on July 23. After the arrest, the men’s names, photos and ID cards were shared in the media and online. Since released, the men are still awaiting legal proceedings. Venezuelan associations have denounced what they see as a growing trend of “criminalisation” of LGBT+ individuals and institutionalised homophobia in Venezuela.

=> ↺ RFA ☛ Malaysian investigators seek public’s help finding missing Myanmar activist, family

• Police circulated photos of Thuzar Maung, husband and children via Facebook.

=> ↺ JURIST ☛ ACLU challenges constitutionality of first US religious charter school in new lawsuit

• The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) filed suit Monday attempting to block the Oklahoma from opening the US’s first religious charter school. The proposed charter school, St. Isidore of Seville Catholic Virtual School, would be run by the Catholic Archdiocese of Oklahoma City.

=> ↺ ACLU ☛ A Religious Public Charter School in Oklahoma? Not on Our Watch.

• A religious school can’t be a public school, and a public school can’t be religious. These fundamental legal tenets have long protected both the integrity of our public-education system, which serves all students, and the right of private religious schools to indoctrinate students in accordance with a particular faith. In approving a Catholic public charter school, however, Oklahoma officials are not just blurring these lines separating church and state; they’re attempting to completely eviscerate them.

=> ↺ Reason ☛ Police Watched as a Man Drowned and Discouraged Bystanders From Helping, Lawsuit Claims

• When a bystander offered to give the officers flotation devices and a small boat, they refused.

=> ↺ RFERL ☛ Bosnian Serb Officials Hit With U.S. Sanctions For Laws Undermining Dayton Peace Accords

• The United States has designated four top Bosnian Serb officials, including the Serb member of the country’s presidency, for sanctions for undermining the Dayton accords that ended the Bosnian War in the 1990s.

=> ↺ RFA ☛ ‘He told me that if I ran away he would report me to the Chinese police’

• North Korean escapees recount their experiences as trafficking victims in China

=> ↺ Jacobin Magazine ☛ Baseball Fans Are Starting to Realize That the Owners Are Not Their Friends

• If Swanson’s research dates back over one hundred years ago, the themes still resonate today. In recent years, the ownership of the Oakland A’s sought to squeeze a multibillion-dollar ballpark out of the city. When they met opposition, ownership turned to MLB commissioner Rob Manfred, who has enthusiastically paved the way for the team to flee to Las Vegas. Oakland fans have been holding “reverse boycott” nights at the stadium this summer, calling out Manfred and demanding that owner John Fisher sell the team. Swanson sees a parallel between the John Fishers of the world and the owners of yesteryear who fought tooth and nail to maintain strict control over the players that fans paid to see.

• Jacobin contributor Michael Arria spoke to Swanson about baseball’s early labor fights, the rise of the MLB players union, and how the opinions of fans have changed over time.

=> ↺ Jacobin Magazine ☛ Today’s Hollywood Strikes Are Fights for Workplace Democracy

• WGA and SAG-AFTRA are doing that, too, in fighting for contract provisions that shape the nature of the work process. Writers are demanding that studios increase the minimum size of writers’ rooms on TV shows and agree to prohibitions on the use of artificial intelligence (AI) in the writing process. Actors, meanwhile, want protections against the use of artificial intelligence (AI)-generated likenesses and limits on the use of self-taped auditions.

• Explaining the union’s position on AI, SAG-AFTRA president Fran Drescher told PBS News Hour, “When [the studios] offer us a deal, and they say that a background person will get paid for one day’s work — we will scan their bodies, and then we can use their likeness in perpetuity — what is going to happen to that background person? He’s out of work. He’s been replaced by AI. That’s unacceptable.”

=> ↺ Futurism ☛ Background Actor Describes When Marvel Made Her Go to a Strange Trailer to Be Scanned

• Alarmingly, Rubalcaba alleges that she and others were never told how or when their 3D likenesses would be used. In fact, the only thing she’s sure of is that she wouldn’t get paid for it, even though she says she never gave permission in the first place.

• For roughly the past twenty years, Hollywood projects have made use of techniques such as crowd tiling to duplicate a few actors to create enormous group scenes. Computer simulations are often used in tandem — or on their own — to create believable, variable behavior in these generated actors, which may be based on motion capture work like in “The Lord of the Rings” trilogy.

• So while this practice isn’t necessarily totally novel, it is now being cast in a much more foreboding light with the pernicious rise of AI in filmmaking, and indeed at large.

=> ↺ NPR ☛ Movie extras worry they’ll be replaced by AI. Hollywood is already doing body scans

• Rubalcaba said the actors had their faces and bodies scanned for about 15 minutes each. Then their digital replicas were created.

• But here’s the rub: She was never told how or if this digital avatar of herself would ever be used on screen. If it’s used, she might never know. No matter what happens with it, she’ll never see any payment for it.

• Disney did not return a request for comment.

=> ↺ El País ☛ In Kenya labor dispute, workers who clean up toxic content on Facebook, TikTok and ChatGPT for $3 an hour go to court

• In addition to the harshness of the content, moderators had to face working conditions that aggravated the situation. “You couldn’t talk to anyone about it, because there was a confidentiality clause. You couldn’t even share with your partner what you were going through… the nature of the job [is that it] destroys your personal life. It was frustrating,” he laments. To this was added the pressure of productivity: “If, in one week, you didn’t reach the required metrics, the next [week] you would receive an email warning you that you weren’t meeting the objectives. The programs controlled how much time you spent on each piece of content. You couldn’t take your eyes off the screen all day. It took two or three seconds from the moment you clicked on a publication until the machine placed another one for you to review. It didn’t give you a moment of calm… even taking a minute to go to the bathroom meant a problem with your supervisor.”

=> ↺ Pro Publica ☛ New Illinois Law Gives Tribal Nations Repatriation and Reburial Power

• Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker signed into law Friday sweeping reforms that for the first time will give tribal nations — not state agencies, universities or museums — final say over how and when the remains of their ancestors and sacred items are returned to them.

• “With the Governor signing these bills into law, Illinois is proving that a government is capable of reflecting on its past injustices and planning for a future that respects and celebrates our interconnectedness,” Prairie Band Potawatomi Nation Chairperson Joseph “Zeke” Rupnick said.

=> ↺ Scheerpost ☛ Caitlin Johnstone: Disrupt The Culture Wars

• One of the great challenges faced by westerners who oppose the political status quo today is the way the narrative managers of both mainstream factions continuously …

=> ↺ Scheerpost ☛ Solitary Confinement Survivors Rally Support for Proposed Federal Ban

• With over 122,000 people in solitary nationwide, lawmakers are seeking to end the practice in federal facilities.

=> ↺ Scheerpost ☛ ‘Unconstitutionally Vague’ Texas Drag Ban Challenged By ACLU

• The Texas drag ban is the subject of a new lawsuit filed by the ACLU of Texas on Wednesday…

=> ↺ Scheerpost ☛ Judge Orders Former Fox News Reporter To Reveal Confidential Source

=> ↺ Scheerpost ☛ Federal Court Strikes Down Mississippi’s ‘Jim Crow’ Felon Disenfranchisement Law

• “Mississippi stands as an outlier among its sister states, bucking a clear national trend in our nation against permanent disenfranchisement.”

Internet Policy/Net Neutrality

=> ↺ Latvia ☛ Internet connections fairly affordable in Latvia

• In 2022, 2.4% of the EU population were unable to afford an internet connection, according to Eurostat data published August 1 to mark World Wide Web day.

=> ↺ Reason ☛ Nevada Magistrate Judge Recommends Rejecting Internet Preservation Challenge—And Why It’s Wrong

• The first opinion on Westlaw in response to a motion to suppress based on my model motion.

=> ↺ New York Times ☛ An Internet Veteran’s Guide to Not Being Scared of Technology

• Mike Masnick, who founded Techdirt in 1998, writes for an influential audience of lawmakers, C.E.O.s and activists. Somehow, he’s still an optimist about the promise of technology.

=> ↺ Reason ☛ Elizabeth Warren and Lindsey Graham Will Break the Internet

• The senators say they’re creating an “independent, bipartisan regulator charged with licensing and policing the nation’s biggest tech companies.” What could go wrong?

Monopolies

=> ↺ IT Wire ☛ Judge gives go-ahead for anti-trust suit against Google over search

• A federal judge in Washington has cleared the way for a government lawsuit against Google over alleged blocking of competition in the search market to proceed from 12 September.

=> ↺ New York Times ☛ Judge Narrows Scope of Google Search Antitrust Case

• The ruling did not affect some central parts of the antitrust cases about Google search, which are scheduled to go to trial next month.

=> ↺ Michael Geist ☛ Backdown or Bailout?: What Comes Next for the Government’s Epic Bill C-18 Miscalculation

• Meta’s announcement this week that it has started to block news links in Canada on both Facebook and Instagram due to Bill C-18’s mandated payments for links approach has sparked a flurry of commentary and coverage. News outlets such as Le Devoir have joined the Globe and Mail in expressing doubt about the government’s approach, news coverage has examined why the Meta ad boycott hasn’t taken off (hint: the government’s own party is still launching new ads) or why the Australian experience hasn’t been replicated in Canada (hint: different law, different time). Meanwhile, the political response has been discouraging with the government pretending to forget the Conservatives’ actual vote against Bill C-18 in the House of Commons, while the Conservatives insist on calling Bill C-18 a censorship bill when it isn’t.

=> ↺ CoryDoctorow ☛ America’s largest hospital chain has an algorithmic death panel

• Businesspeople understand the risks of competition, which is why they seek to extinguish it. The harder it is for your customers to leave – because of a lack of competitors or because of lock-in – the worse you can treat them without risking their departure. This is the core of enshittification: a company that is neither disciplined by competition nor regulation can abuse its customers and suppliers over long timescales without losing either:

• https://pluralistic.net/2023/01/21/potemkin-ai/#hey-guys

• It’s not that public institutions can’t betray they public interest. It’s just that public institutions can be made democratically accountable, rather than financially accountable. When a company betrays you, you can only punish it by “voting with your wallet.” In that system, the people with the fattest wallets get the most votes.

Patents

=> ↺ Unified Patents ☛ Route Guidance Systems vehicle guidance patent found invalid

• On August 3, 2023, the Central Reexamination Unit (CRU) entered a final rejection of all claims of U.S. Patent 6,917,876, owned by Route Guidance Systems LLC, an NPE. The ’876 patent is directed to route guidance systems for vehicles where the calculated route is transmitted from a central computer to a vehicle over a channel of communication in a short burst and is then closed, so that transmission to the vehicle ceases, unless and until a need for further transmission arises.

=> ↺ Unified Patents ☛ VDPP video codec patent reexam granted

• On July 26, 2023, less than two months after Unified filed an ex parte reexamination, the Central Reexamination Unit (CRU) granted Unified’s request, finding a substantial new question of patentability on the challenged claims of U.S. Patent 9,699,444, owned and asserted by VDPP LLC, an NPE.

=> ↺ Dennis Crouch/Patently-O ☛ Special Committee: Newman Should be Suspended for 1 Year based upon Refusal to Undergo Medical Examinations

• The Federal Circuit Special Committee has released a 100+ page report that recommends Judge Pauline Newman be suspended for her refusal to comply with the committee’s order that would permit an independent doctor conduct a mental or physical examination.   The proposed suspension for “one year or until she complies.”  This report will be delivered to the Judicial Council that will make its own decision.  I expect that the Judicial Council will agree with the sanction.

=> ↺ Unified Patents ☛ $2,000 awarded for Dominion Harbor entity, Monument Peak Ventures, color editing patent prior art

• Unified is pleased to announce PATROLL crowdsourcing contest winner, Poonam Rani, was awarded $2,000 for his prior art submission on U.S. Patent 6,396,599, owned by Monument Peak Ventures, an NPE and Dominion Harbor entity.

Software Patents

=> ↺ The Register UK ☛ Read lips? Siri wants to feel them, according to fresh Apple patent

• Motion sensors in devices “may detect muscle movement, vibrations, head motions, and the like and output a stream of data representing the specific force, angular rate, and/or orientation created by said motions,” Apple boffins wrote in their patent filing. These sensors could be embedded in wearable devices like a pair of AirPods, “smart glasses, or the like.”

Copyrights

=> ↺ New York Times ☛ Meta Removes News From Platform in Canada

• A Canadian law that will require tech companies to compensate domestic publishers has led Meta to start blocking news articles on its social networks.

=> ↺ New Yorker ☛ World Wide Gecs

• Laura Les and Dylan Brady, the duo behind the hyperpop band 100 gecs, are children of the Internet, which has offered them a seemingly divisionless array of musical influences.

=> ↺ Techdirt ☛ Disney Deletes Months Old Film From Disney Plus, Ostensibly For More Tax Benefits

• Here we go again. It was only a month ago that Karl Bode wrote about Disney’s absolutely and totally cool process of removing a bunch of content from its Disney Plus streaming platform not because the content sucks and nobody liked it, but because it gets to play accounting tricks as to its assets in order to receive giant tax breaks. To some extent, a big media company prioritizing quarterly profit reports over providing customers value in its streaming platform is very much “Dog Bites Man” territory. However, it appears Disney isn’t particularly shy about taking this practice to absurd levels.

=> ↺ Torrent Freak ☛ Spain’s Pirate Site Blocking Machine: Domains Blocked 2012 – 2023

• The Second Section of the Intellectual Property Commission (S2CPI) is the body responsible for Spain’s administrative pirate site blocking program. Since its launch in 2012, S2CPI has received almost 843 applications and issued instructions for local ISPs to block hundreds of ‘pirate’ domains. One site in particular has kept the authorities disproportionately busy.

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