'); document.write('

Slashdot
News for nerds, stuff that matters

'); document.write('

Netflix\'s Live-Action One Piece Series Is Coming In 2023 (BeauHD)
'); document.write('2023-01-31 10:00:00
'); document.write('Netflix has confirmed that its live-action take on One Piece will be streaming in 2023. The Verge reports: That\'s about all we know so far; Netflix didn\'t give a specific date, though the company did show off a new poster for its adaptation of Eiichiro Oda\'s long-running pirate manga / anime. The adaptation was first announced back in 2020 and will be led by showrunners Matt Owens and Steven Maeda. The main cast includes the likes of Inaki Godoy as Luffy (who you can see the back of in the new poster), Mackenyu as Zoro, Emily Rudd as Nami, Jacob Romero Gibson as Usopp, and Taz Skylar as Sanji. The Verge notes that One Piece \"follows some less-than-impressive live-action anime adaptations from Netflix, including a Death Note film and a Cowboy Bebop series that was canceled after one season.\" Read more of this story at Slashdot.'); document.write('
After a Failure 4 Months Ago, the New Shepard Spacecraft Remains In Limbo (BeauHD)
'); document.write('2023-01-31 07:00:00
'); document.write('schwit1 shares a report from Ars Technica: More than four months have passed since the launch of Blue Origin\'s New Shepard rocket ended in failure. No humans were onboard the vehicle because it was conducting a suborbital scientific research mission, but the failure has grounded the New Shepard fleet ever since. The rocket\'s single main engine failed about one minute into the flight, at an altitude of around 9 km, as it was throttling back up after passing through the period of maximum dynamic pressure. At that point a large fire erupted in the BE-3 engine, and the New Shepard capsule\'s solid rocket motor-powered escape system fired as intended, pulling the capsule away from the exploding rocket. The capsule experienced high G-forces during this return but appeared to make a safe landing. Three days after this accident with the New Shepard-23 mission, the bipartisan leadership of the House Subcommittee on Space and Aeronautics sent a letter to the Federal Aviation Administration, calling for a thorough investigation. In an interview with Ars later that month, the chair of the subcommittee, US Rep. Don Beyer (D-Va.), urged Blue Origin to be transparent. \"I\'m heavily in favor of transparency, and I\'m hoping that the FAA comes through pretty quickly with this,\" Beyer said. \"I would strongly encourage Blue Origin to be as transparent as possible, because that builds trust. It doesn\'t have to be overnight, but it would be nice to keep people updated on the progress they\'re making.\" The company has not heeded this advice. An application filed with the FCC last week suggests Blue Origin might target a launch for its next New Shepard flight between April 1 and June 1. However, a spokesperson downplayed that speculation, saying it is not tied to a specific launch. \"As a matter of course, we submit rolling FCC license requests to ensure we have continuous coverage for launches,\" the spokesperson said. It\'s also unclear whether this next launch will be an uncrewed or a crewed mission. Slashdot reader schwit1 adds: \"For the time being, the New Space Race is pretty much Elon vs the World.\" Read more of this story at Slashdot.'); document.write('
AI-Generated Voice Firm Clamps Down After 4chan Makes Celebrity Voices For Abuse (BeauHD)
'); document.write('2023-01-31 03:30:00
'); document.write('An anonymous reader quotes a report from Motherboard: It was only a matter of time before the wave of artificial intelligence-generated voice startups became a play thing of internet trolls. On Monday, ElevenLabs, founded by ex-Google and Palantir staffers, said it had found an \"increasing number of voice cloning misuse cases\" during its recently launched beta. ElevenLabs didn\'t point to any particular instances of abuse, but Motherboard found 4chan members appear to have used the product to generate voices that sound like Joe Rogan, Ben Sharpio, and Emma Watson to spew racist and other sorts of material. ElevenLabs said it is exploring more safeguards around its technology. The clips uploaded to 4chan on Sunday are focused on celebrities. But given the high quality of the generated voices, and the apparent ease at which people created them, they highlight the looming risk of deepfake audio clips. In much the same way deepfake video started as a method for people to create non-consensual pornography of specific people before branching onto other use cases, the trajectory of deepfake audio is only just beginning. [...] The clips run the gamut from harmless, to violent, to transphobic, to homophobic, to racist. One 4chan post that included a wide spread of the clips also contained a link to the beta from ElevenLabs, suggesting ElevenLabs\' software may have been used to create the voices. On its website ElevenLabs offers both \"speech synthesis\" and \"voice cloning.\" For the latter, ElevenLabs says it can generate a clone of someone\'s voice from a clean sample recording, over one minute in length. Users can quickly sign up to the service and start generating voices. ElevenLabs also offers \"professional cloning,\" which it says can reproduce any accent. Target use cases include voicing newsletters, books, and videos, the company\'s website adds. [...] On Monday, shortly after the clips circulated on 4chan, ElevenLabs wrote on Twitter that \"Crazy weekend -- thank you to everyone for trying out our Beta platform. While we see our tech being overwhelmingly applied to positive use, we also see an increasing number of voice cloning misuse cases.\" ElevenLabs added that while it can trace back any generated audio to a specific user, it was exploring more safeguards. These include requiring payment information or \"full ID identification\" in order to perform voice cloning, or manually verifying every voice cloning request. Read more of this story at Slashdot.'); document.write('
KeePass Disputes Vulnerability Allowing Stealthy Password Theft (BeauHD)
'); document.write('2023-01-31 02:02:00
'); document.write('The development team behind the open-source password management software KeePass is disputing what is described as a newly found vulnerability that allows attackers to stealthily export the entire database in plain text. BleepingComputer reports: KeePass is a very popular open-source password manager that allows you to manage your passwords using a locally stored database, rather than a cloud-hosted one, such as LastPass or Bitwarden. To secure these local databases, users can encrypt them using a master password so that malware or a threat actor can\'t just steal the database and automatically gain access to the passwords stored within it. The new vulnerability is now tracked as CVE-2023-24055, and it enables threat actors with write access to a target\'s system to alter the KeePass XML configuration file and inject a malicious trigger that would export the database, including all usernames and passwords in cleartext. The next time the target launches KeePass and enters the master password to open and decrypt the database, the export rule will be triggered, and the contents of the database will be saved to a file the attackers can later exfiltrate to a system under their control. However, this export process launches in the background without the user being notified or KeePass requesting the master password to be entered as confirmation before exporting, allowing the threat actor to quietly gain access to all of the stored passwords. [...] While the CERT teams of Netherlands and Belgium have also issued security advisories regarding CVE-2023-24055, the KeePass development team is arguing that this shouldn\'t be classified as a vulnerability given that attackers with write access to a target\'s device can also obtain the information contained within the KeePass database through other means. In fact, a \"Security Issues\" page on the KeePass Help Center has been describing the \"Write Access to Configuration File\" issue since at least April 2019 as \"not really a security vulnerability of KeePass.\" If the user has installed KeePass as a regular program and the attackers have write access, they can also \"perform various kinds of attacks.\" Threat actors can also replace the KeePass executable with malware if the user runs the portable version. \"In both cases, having write access to the KeePass configuration file typically implies that an attacker can actually perform much more powerful attacks than modifying the configuration file (and these attacks in the end can also affect KeePass, independent of a configuration file protection),\" the KeePass developers explain. \"These attacks can only be prevented by keeping the environment secure (by using an anti-virus software, a firewall, not opening unknown e-mail attachments, etc.). KeePass cannot magically run securely in an insecure environment.\" If the KeePass devs don\'t release a version of the app that addresses this issue, BleepingComputer notes \"you could still secure your database by logging in as a system admin and creating an enforced configuration file.\" \"This type of config file takes precedence over settings described in global and local configuration files, including new triggers added by malicious actors, thus mitigating the CVE-2023-24055 issue.\" Read more of this story at Slashdot.'); document.write('
Students Lost One-Third of a School Year To Pandemic, Study Finds (BeauHD)
'); document.write('2023-01-31 01:25:00
'); document.write('Children experienced learning deficits during the Covid pandemic that amounted to about one-third of a school year\'s worth of knowledge and skills, according to a new global analysis, and had not recovered from those losses more than two years later. The New York Times reports: Learning delays and regressions were most severe in developing countries and among students from low-income backgrounds, researchers said, worsening existing disparities and threatening to follow children into higher education and the work force. The analysis, published Monday in the journal Nature Human Behavior and drawing on data from 15 countries, provided the most comprehensive account to date of the academic hardships wrought by the pandemic. The findings suggest that the challenges of remote learning -- coupled with other stressors that plagued children and families throughout the pandemic -- were not rectified when school doors reopened. \"In order to recover what was lost, we have to be doing more than just getting back to normal,\" said Bastian Betthauser, a researcher at the Center for Research on Social Inequalities at Sciences Po in Paris, who was a co-author on the review. He urged officials worldwide to provide intensive summer programs and tutoring initiatives that target poorer students who fell furthest behind. Thomas Kane, the faculty director of the Center for Education Policy Research at Harvard, who has studied school interruptions in the United States, reviewed the global analysis. Without immediate and aggressive intervention, he said, \"learning loss will be the longest-lasting and most inequitable legacy of the pandemic.\" [...] Because children have a finite capacity to absorb new material, Mr. Betthauser said, teachers cannot simply move faster or extend school hours, and traditional interventions like private tutoring rarely target the most disadvantaged groups. Without creative solutions, he said, the labor market ought to \"brace for serious downstream effects.\" Children who were in school during the pandemic could lose about $70,000 in earnings over their lifetimes if the deficits aren\'t recovered, according to Eric Hanushek, an economist at the Hoover Institution at Stanford. In some states, pandemic-era students could ultimately earn almost 10 percent less than those who were educated just before the pandemic. The societal losses, he said, could amount to $28 trillion over the rest of the century. Read more of this story at Slashdot.'); document.write('
Frontier\'s Bringing Its 5-Gig Fiber Network Across the Country (BeauHD)
'); document.write('2023-01-31 00:45:00
'); document.write('Frontier, an internet service provider (ISP) that services 25 US states, has just launched 5 Gig fiber internet service across its entire network. The Verge reports: Frontier launched 2 Gig fiber internet service less than a year ago, and the 5 Gig plan is currently available in all of Frontier\'s fiber-connected markets, with no phased rollouts. Compared to the cable-bound internet that most of us are familiar with, Frontier\'s 5 Gig internet is reported to have upload speeds that are up to 125 times faster and up to five times faster downloads, all delivered with less latency. The new 5 Gig network is one of the fastest internet options currently available in the US, with other fiber-enabled ISPs like Verizon Fios and Google Fiber still capped at around 2Gbps. Right now, the only other 5 Gig network currently available in the US is through AT&T, which offers 2 Gig and 5 Gig plans. Google Fiber is also slated to add 5-gig and 8-gig plans to its lineup sometime this year, despite its numerous setbacks. Read more of this story at Slashdot.'); document.write('
Massive Yandex Code Leak Reveals Russian Search Engine\'s Ranking Factors (BeauHD)
'); document.write('2023-01-31 00:02:00
'); document.write('An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: Nearly 45GB of source code files, allegedly stolen by a former employee, have revealed the underpinnings of Russian tech giant Yandex\'s many apps and services. It also revealed key ranking factors for Yandex\'s search engine, the kind almost never revealed in public. [...] While it\'s not clear whether there are security or structural implications of Yandex\'s source code revelation, the leak of 1,922 ranking factors in Yandex\'s search algorithm is certainly making waves. SEO consultant Martin MacDonald described the hack on Twitter as \"probably the most interesting thing to have happened in SEO in years\" (as noted by Search Engine Land). In a thread detailing some of the more notable factors, researcher Alex Buraks suggests that \"there is a lot of useful information for Google SEO as well.\" Yandex, the fourth-ranked search engine by volume, purportedly employs several ex-Google employees. Yandex tracks many of Google\'s ranking factors, identifiable in its code, and competes heavily with Google. Google\'s Russian division recently filed for bankruptcy after losing its bank accounts and payment services. Buraks notes that the first factor in Yandex\'s list of ranking factors is \"PAGE_RANK,\" which is seemingly tied to the foundational algorithm created by Google\'s co-founders. As detailed by Buraks (in two threads), Yandex\'s engine favors pages that: - Aren\'t too old - Have a lot of organic traffic (unique visitors) and less search-driven traffic - Have fewer numbers and slashes in their URL - Have optimized code rather than \"hard pessimization,\" with a \"PR=0\" - Are hosted on reliable servers - Happen to be Wikipedia pages or are linked from Wikipedia - Are hosted or linked from higher-level pages on a domain - Have keywords in their URL (up to three) Read more of this story at Slashdot.'); document.write('
JD Sports Admits Intruder Accessed 10 Million Customers\' Data (BeauHD)
'); document.write('2023-01-30 23:20:00
'); document.write('Sports fashion retailer JD Sports has confirmed miscreants broke into a system that contained data on a whopping 10 million customers, but no payment information was among the mix. The Register reports: In a post to investors this morning, the London Stock Exchange-listed business said the intrusion related to infrastructure that housed data for online orders from sub-brands including JD, Size? Millets, Blacks, Scotts and MilletSport between November 2018 and October 2020. The data accessed consisted of customer name, billing address, delivery address, phone number, order details and the final four digits of payment cards \"of approximately 10 million unique customers.\" The company does \"not hold full payment card details\" and said that it has \"no reason to believe that account passwords were accessed.\" As is customary in such incidents, JD Sports has contacted the relevant authorities such as the Information Commissioner\'s Office and says it has enlisted the help of \"leading cyber security experts.\" The chain has stores across Europe, with some operating in North America and Canada. It also operates some footwear brands including Go Outdoors and Shoe Palace. \"We want to apologize to those customers who may have been affected by this incident,\" said Neil Greenhalgh, chief financial officer at JD Sports. \"We are advising them to be vigilant about potential scam emails, calls and texts and providing details on now to report these.\" He added: \"We are continuing with a full review of our cyber security in partnership with external specialists following this incident. Protecting that data of our customers is an absolute priority for JS.\" Read more of this story at Slashdot.'); document.write('
Impossible Foods Plans To Lay Off About 20% of Workers (BeauHD)
'); document.write('2023-01-30 22:40:00
'); document.write('Impossible Foods, which makes plant-based nuggets, burgers and patties, is reportedly laying off 20% of its staff, Bloomberg reported first. TechCrunch reports: According to the story, the 12-year-old company currently employs about 700 workers, which could then affect over 100 employees. This comes as the company made a 6% reduction in its workforce last October. While we know layoffs can happen anytime, it seems like the company was doing well. Earlier this month, the Redwood City, California-based company reported a year of record sales that included over 50% dollar sales growth in 2022. The company also touted that its Impossible Beef product was \"the best-selling product by volume of any plant-based meat brand in the U.S.\" Months before that, CEO Peter McGuinness said in an interview with Bloomberg Technology that the company had a strong balance sheet, good cash flow and growth of between 65% to 70%. In total, Impossible raised $1.9 billion in venture capital, according to Crunchbase data. The last time the company raised capital was a $500 million Series H round in November 2021, and it was at that time that the company was valued at $7 billion. [...] Impossible is not the only plant-based meat alternative company to make layoffs in recent months. In a regulatory filing made last October, Beyond Meat said it planned to lay off about 200 employees, or 19% of its workforce, as part of cost-saving measures as sales were slumping. Read more of this story at Slashdot.'); document.write('
PikaOS Is a Next-Gen Linux Distribution Aimed Specifically Towards Gamers (BeauHD)
'); document.write('2023-01-30 22:02:00
'); document.write('An anonymous reader quotes a report from ZDNet, written by Jack Wallen: PikaOS is very similar to that of Nobara Linux, which opts for a Fedora base. But what are these two Linux distributions? Simply put, they are Linux for gamers. [...] So, what does PikaOS do that so many other distributions do not? The most obvious thing is that it makes it considerably easier to install the tools needed to play games. Upon first logging in, you\'re greeted with a Welcome app. In the First Steps tab, you have quick access to tools for updating the system, installing patented codecs and libraries, installing propriety Nvidia drivers, installing apps from the Software Manager, and installing WebApps. Next comes the Recommended Additions, where you can install the likes of: PikaOS Game Utilities is a meta package that installs Steam, Lutris, GOverlay, MangoHud, Wine, Winetricks, vkBasalt, and other gaming-centric tools; Microsoft TrueType fonts for better Windows font emulation; Blender for creating 3D images; OBS Studio for streaming; Kdenlive for non-linear video editing; Krita for painting; and LibreOffice for productivity. In the Optional Steps tab, you can add AMD proprietary drivers, ROCm drivers, Xone drivers, and Proton GE (for Steam and Wine compatibility). Finally, the Look And Feel tab allows you to customize themes, layouts, and extensions. The layouts section is pretty nifty, as it allows you to configure the GNOME desktop to look and feel like a more traditional desktop, a MacOS-like desktop, a Windows 11 layout, a throwback GNOME 2 desktop, and even a Ubuntu Unity-like desktop. As far as pre-installed software goes, it\'s pretty bare bones (until you start adding titles from the Recommended Additions tab in the Welcome App). You\'ll find Firefox (web browser), Geary (email), Pidgin (messaging), Weather, Calculator, Cheese (web camera software), Rhythmbox, Contacts, a few utilities, and basic games. However, installing new apps is quite simple via the Software Manager app. Of course, the focus of PikaOS is games. When you install the PikaOS Game Utilities, you\'ll get Steam installed, which makes it easy to play an endless array of games on the Linux desktop. One thing to keep in mind, however, is that when you launch the PikaOS Game Utilities installation, it opens a terminal window to run the installation. Give this plenty of time to complete and, in the end, you can launch Steam, log in to your Steam account, and start playing. Just remember, the first time you launch the Steam app, it will take a moment to update and configure. But once it\'s up and running... let the games begin. Read more of this story at Slashdot.'); document.write('
Philips To Cut 13% of Jobs in Safety and Profitability Drive (msmash)
'); document.write('2023-01-30 21:21:00
'); document.write('Dutch health technology company Philips will scrap another 6,000 jobs worldwide as it tries to restore its profitability and improve the safety of its products following a recall of respiratory devices that knocked off 70% of its market value. From a report: Half of the job cuts will be made this year, the company said on Monday, adding that the other half will be realised by 2025. The new reorganisation brings the total amount of job cuts announced by new Chief Executive Roy Jakobs in recent months to 10,000, or around 13% of Philips\' current workforce. Read more of this story at Slashdot.'); document.write('
US Renewable Energy Farms Outstrip 99% of Coal Plants Economically (msmash)
'); document.write('2023-01-30 20:40:00
'); document.write('Coal in the US is now being economically outmatched by renewables to such an extent that it\'s more expensive for 99% of the country\'s coal-fired power plants to keep running than it is to build an entirely new solar or wind energy operation nearby, a new analysis has found. From a report: The plummeting cost of renewable energy, which has been supercharged by last year\'s Inflation Reduction Act, means that it is cheaper to build an array of solar panels or a cluster of new wind turbines and connect them to the grid than it is to keep operating all of the 210 coal plants in the contiguous US, bar one, according to the study. \"Coal is unequivocally more expensive than wind and solar resources, it\'s just no longer cost competitive with renewables,\" said Michelle Solomon, a policy analyst at Energy Innovation, which undertook the analysis. \"This report certainly challenges the narrative that coal is here to stay.\" The new analysis, conducted in the wake of the $370bn in tax credits and other support for clean energy passed by Democrats in last summer\'s Inflation Reduction Act, compared the fuel, running and maintenance cost of America\'s coal fleet with the building of new solar or wind from scratch in the same utility region. On average, the marginal cost for the coal plants is $36 each megawatt hour, while new solar is about $24 each megawatt hour, or about a third cheaper. Only one coal plant -- Dry Fork in Wyoming -- is cost competitive with the new renewables. \"It was a bit surprising to find this,\" said Solomon. \"It shows that not only have renewables dropped in cost, the Inflation Reduction Act is accelerating this trend.\" Read more of this story at Slashdot.'); document.write('
Taxes Slow India\'s Solar Power Rollout But Boost Manufacture (msmash)
'); document.write('2023-01-30 20:01:00
'); document.write('An anonymous reader shares a report: In May last year Fortum India, a subsidiary of a Finnish solar developer, won the bid for a solar power project in the state of Gujarat. The project was due to be completed three months ago and would have generated enough electricity for 200,000 homes. But like many other solar power projects in the country, it\'s been delayed as Fortum India struggles to source and pay for necessary components. \"For the last six months, we have not been able to finish developing any new projects,\" said Manoj Gupta, who oversees Fortum India\'s solar projects in India. Gupta said solar panels and cells have become obstructively expensive because of protective taxes the Indian federal government implemented in April last year. The basic customs duty imposes a levy of 40% on imported solar modules and 25% on solar cells. The government says it wants to encourage the domestic manufacture of components required to produce solar power and reduce the country\'s reliance on imports. But solar developers say homegrown producers, while rapidly growing and being pushed along by policy initiatives, are still too fledgling to meet demand. Current cell and module manufacturing capacity in India is around 44 gigawatts per year, just a fraction of what\'s needed to meet India\'s renewable aims. In 2022, India had a target to install 100 gigawatts of solar energy as part of goal to add 175 gigawatts of clean electricity to its grid. But only 63 gigawatts of solar power were ultimately installed last year, according to Indian federal government data. India missed its 2022 renewable energy target by just nine gigawatts. \"Without these duties we would have easily achieved our targets for larger solar projects, at least,\" said Jyoti Gulia of the renewable energy research and advisory firm JMK Research. Most solar developers in India and around the world rely on China, with the nation producing more than 80% of the world\'s solar components, according to the International Energy Agency. Read more of this story at Slashdot.'); document.write('
Japan Plans New Government Unit To Deal With Disinformation Campaigns (msmash)
'); document.write('2023-01-30 19:21:00
'); document.write('Japan\'s government is making arrangements to launch a new unit next year that deals with the spread of disinformation. From a report: Experts say disinformation spread through social media networks could influence public opinion and cause social turmoil. Some analysts say Russia has employed such methods against Ukraine and that China has done so against Taiwan. Chief Cabinet Secretary Matsuno Hirokazu says spreading fake information not only threatens universal values but could also affect security. Read more of this story at Slashdot.'); document.write('
China Smartphone Market Slumps To 10-Year Low (msmash)
'); document.write('2023-01-30 18:41:00
'); document.write('After a decade of frantic growth, China\'s smartphone market is hitting a speed bump as COVID-19 roils the world\'s second-largest economy. From a report: The country\'s smartphone shipments dropped 14% year-over-year in 2022, reaching a ten-year low, according to research firm Counterpoint. It was also the first time that China\'s handset sales had slid below 300 million units in ten years, according to Canalys. Even in December, which has historically seen seasonal jumps in sales, China recorded a 5% quarter-to-quarter decline in smartphone shipments. The three-year-long stringent \"zero-COVID\" policy that disrupted businesses and dampened consumer confidence, coupled with global macroeconomic headwinds, spelled an end to China\'s years of double-digit growth. Troubles mounted when the abrupt relaxation of COVID-19 restrictions in early December resulted in a surge in cases, further adding pressure to the waning economy. Last year, China\'s GDP grew 3%, its lowest in decades other than 2020. Read more of this story at Slashdot.'); document.write('