How Cybercriminals Almost Stole $1 Billion From Bangladesh's National Bank
"In 2016 North Korean hackers planned a $1bn raid on Bangladesh's national bank," reports the BBC, "and came within an inch of success — it was only by a fluke that all but $81m of the transfers were halted, report Geoff White and Jean H Lee... "It all started with a malfunctioning printer..." It was located inside a highly secure room on the… Read More »
Posted on 21 June 2021 | 11:34 amHow Quantum Computers are Already Untangling Nature's Mysteries
Wired published a long extract from Amit Katwala's book Quantum Computing: How It Works and How It Could Change the World — explaining how it's already being put to use to explore some of science's biggest secrets by simulating nature itelf: Some of the world's top scientists are engaged in a frantic race to find new battery technologies that… Read More »
Posted on 21 June 2021 | 7:34 amMicrosoft Linux Repos Suffered 22-Hour Outage
"Everything from Visual Studio Code to Microsoft Edge and Teams package links were affected," reports Windows Central. They note Azure's status page (which now shows the issue lasting for more than 22 hours), though however long it lasted, "it's a virtual eternity for those whose entire ecosystem is crippled by such an outage." According to Ars… Read More »
Posted on 21 June 2021 | 4:38 amA Rural County's New Universal Basic Income Experiment - and the Case Against It
Amid worries that technological advances may someday eliminate jobs, the Associated Press reports on a new experimental universal basic income program in upstate New York: During the pilot program, funded by private donations, 100 county residents making less than $46,900 annually will get $500 a month for a year. The income threshold was based… Read More »
Posted on 21 June 2021 | 2:39 amA Real Estate Mogul Will Spend $100 Million to Fix Social Media Using Blockchain
"Frank McCourt, the billionaire real estate mogul and former owner of the Los Angeles Dodgers, is pouring $100 million into an attempt to rebuild the foundations of social media," reports Bloomberg: The effort, which he has loftily named Project Liberty, centers on the construction of a publicly accessible database of people's social connections,… Read More »
Posted on 21 June 2021 | 12:44 amReport: Hackers Breached More US Water Treatment Plants
"On January 15, a hacker tried to poison a water treatment plant that served parts of the San Francisco Bay Area," reports NBC News: It didn't seem hard. The hacker had the username and password for a former employee's TeamViewer account, a popular program that lets users remotely control their computers, according to a private report compiled by… Read More »
Posted on 20 June 2021 | 11:13 pm