Innholdsfortegnelse for #505 i Techlife News

Richard Branson’s Virgin Orbit delivered satellites from three countries into space Wednesday, its second successful rocket launch from a plane. The company’s modified 747 jet dubbed Cosmic Girl jet took off from California’s Mojave Desert, carrying the 70-foot (21-meter) rocket beneath its left wing. Once the plane was over the Pacific near the Channel Islands, the LauncherOne rocket peeled away, then fired its engine to head to space. The drop occurred at an altitude of about 37,000 feet (11,000 meters). Camera views showed the package of seven small satellites on the end of the second stage, against the curve of the blue Earth. The satellites are from the U.S. Defense Department, the Royal Netherlands Air Force and Poland’s SatRevolution company, which is working to set up an Earth-observing constellation. Virgin…

A bill touted as the country’s strictest statewide regulation on the use of facial recognition technology has become law in Maine. While several states regulate facial recognition as a surveillance tool, the Maine law represents a broad prohibition of the technology at the state, county and municipal government levels, with limited exceptions for law enforcement purposes, officials said. The ACLU of Maine said it’s the strongest statewide facial recognition regulation in the country, and the bill’s sponsor, Rep. Grayson Lookner, called it “a huge victory for privacy rights and civil liberties in Maine.” “I hope that Maine can provide an example to other states that want to rein in the government’s ability to use facial recognition and other invasive biometric technologies,” said Lookner, D-Portland. The bill became law without the…

U.S. and British agencies disclosed on Thursday details of methods they say have been used by Russian intelligence to break into the cloud services of hundreds of government agencies, energy companies and other organizations. An advisory released by the U.S. National Security Agency describes “brute force” attacks by operatives linked to the GRU, the Russian military intelligence agency, which has been previously tied to major cyberattacks abroad and efforts to disrupt the 2016 and 2020 American elections. Brute force attacks involve the automated spraying of sites with potential passwords until hackers gain access. The advisory urges companies to adopt methods long urged by experts as common-sense cyber hygiene, including the use of multi-factor authentication and mandating strong passwords. Issued during a devastating wave of ransomware attacks on governments and key…

Virgin Galactic finally has the federal government’s approval to start launching customers into space from New Mexico. Richard Branson’s rocketship company announced the Federal Aviation Administration’s updated license. It’s the final hurdle in Virgin Galactic’s yearslong effort to send paying passengers on short space hops. The company is working toward three more space test flights this summer and early fall, before opening the rocketship’s doors to paying customers. The original plans called for company engineers to launch next to evaluate equipment, followed by a flight with Branson and then a science mission by Italian Air Force officers. In the meantime, Blue Origin’s Jeff Bezos earlier this month announced plans to ride his own rocket into space July 20 from Texas. Virgin Galactic officials acknowledged the growing chatter over whether Branson…

Search teams have been using drones, sonar, highly sensitive microphones and a range of other new and established technologies to help search for people in the oceanside condominium building near Miami that collapsed into a smoldering pile of rubble. Will any of it help? About 150 people were still unaccounted amid fears that the death toll of at least four could go much higher. WHAT TECHNOLOGIES HAVE PROVEN USEFUL IN SUCH COLLAPSES? The most common, time-tested technologies used to try to locate survivors in rubble are acoustic detection and sniffer dogs. Aerial drones equipped with cameras and other sensors can be useful to get a close look at the collapse, especially in the earliest stages of a search to help rescuers know where it’s safe to enter. Data from smartphones…

Federal regulators have indicated they likely won’t certify Boeing’s next airliner until 2023 because of questions about changes the aircraft manufacturer is making in software and hardware on a new version of the two-aisle 777 jet. The Federal Aviation Administration’s concerns are just the latest setback for Boeing, which originally predicted that the plane would enter airline service in 2020. Boeing shares fell more than 3.5% after the announcement. An FAA official listed 11 concerns in a May 13 letter to Boeing that surfaced over the weekend. Among them: a Dec. 8 flight in which the plane’s nose turned up or down without pilots directing it to do so. Another Boeing plane, the 737 Max, suffered two fatal crashes after an automated system on the plane pushed the nose down,…

A federal judge dismissed antitrust lawsuits brought against Facebook by the Federal Trade Commission and a coalition of state attorneys general, dealing a significant blow to attempts by regulators to rein in tech giants. U.S. District Judge James Boasberg ruled that the lawsuits were “legally insufficient” and didn’t provide enough evidence to prove that Facebook was a monopoly. The ruling dismisses the complaint but not the case, meaning the FTC could refile another complaint. “These allegations — which do not even provide an estimated actual figure or range for Facebook’s market share at any point over the past ten years — ultimately fall short of plausibly establishing that Facebook holds market power,” he said. The FTC said in a statement that it is “closely reviewing the opinion and assessing the…

It’s intriguing to imagine Liam Neeson’s management team, contemplating his next film. Perhaps “Uber Express”? Maybe “Lyfted Up”? There’s just something symbiotic about Neeson and vehicles — not only cars, but planes (“Non-Stop”), suburban commuter trains (“The Commuter”), even snowplows (“Cold Pursuit”). And now in “The Ice Road,” this durable action hero improbably pushing 70 is at the wheel of a big ol’ truck — not your normal truck, but a 65,000-pound rig. And not on regular roads, of course. On ice roads, meaning frozen lakes or oceans, where the spring thaw brings treacherous conditions and one wrong move sends you straight into the freezing abyss. Luckily, Neeson has a way of lending his rough-hewn dignity to even the most perfunctory of plots — because this one, it must be…

U.K. regulators said that they’re investigating Google and Amazon over concerns the online giants aren’t doing enough to stop fake reviews of products and services on their platforms. The Competition and Markets Authority said it opened a formal investigation into whether the two companies broke U.K. consumer law by failing to protect shoppers. The watchdog started looking into phony reviews on some big websites last year - without identifying any specific ones - amid the pandemic-fueled boom in online shopping. “Our worry is that millions of online shoppers could be misled by reading fake reviews and then spending their money based on those recommendations,” the watchdog’s chief executive Andrea Coscelli said in a press statement. “Equally, it’s simply not fair if some businesses can fake 5-star reviews to give their…

The U.S. Navy pulled the plug, for now, on a futuristic weapon that fires projectiles at up to seven times the speed of sound using electricity. The Navy spent more than a decade developing the electromagnetic railgun and once considered putting them on the stealthy new Zumwalt-class destroyers built at Maine’s Bath Iron Works. But the Defense Department is turning its attention to hypersonic missiles to keep up with China and Russia, and the Navy cut funding for railgun research from its latest budget proposal. “The railgun is, for the moment, dead,” said Matthew Caris, a defense analyst at Avascent Group, a consulting firm. The removal of funding suggests the Navy saw both challenges in implementing the technology as well as shortcomings in the projectiles’ range compared to hypersonic missiles,…

When a wildfire tore through Briceburg nearly two years ago, the tiny community on the edge of Yosemite National Park lost the only power line connecting it to the electrical grid. Rather than rebuilding poles and wires over increasingly dry hillsides, which could raise the risk of equipment igniting catastrophic fires, the nation’s largest utility decided to give Briceburg a self-reliant power system. The stand-alone grid made of solar panels, batteries and a backup generator began operating this month. It’s the first of potentially hundreds of its kind as Pacific Gas & Electric works to prevent another deadly fire like the one that forced it to file for bankruptcy in 2019. The ramping up of this technology is among a number of strategies to improve energy resilience in California as…

As the European summer vacation season hit its stride Thursday with a new EU-wide travel pass in place, the bloc’s medical office and a top airline chief issued reassuring messages on traveling, despite the threat of the surging delta coronavirus variant. Many airports saw busy scenes as masses of people sought to escape to the sunny southern European Union nations for a beach holiday, with the digital COVID-19 travel certificate a must-have. The EU Digital Certificate came officially into effect Thursday even though many member states had started introducing it over the past month, seeking to boost their summer season by making movement as seamless as possible. “With this, everyone in Europe should be able to travel safely and freely this summer,” said EU Commission spokesman Christian Wigand. And in…

1. SPEEDING UP YOUR IPHONE If you’ve had your iPhone for a number of years, the chances are that it’s started to slow down. That’s because components can wear out and your devices fill up with files, apps, and forgotten photographs that you no longer need. What’s more, software updates for iOS are designed to take advantage of the latest iPhones and their processors, but there are ways to speed up an older device. Turn off your device to clear its memory, delete unwanted apps and files, and turn off background app refresh to avoid wasting processing power. It’s wise to upgrade to the latest versions of iOS, but you should avoid beta testing on older devices. 2. TELL PEOPLE YOU’LL CALL THEM BACK One of the most well-known features…

Groundbreaking legislation is advancing in Congress that would curb the market power of tech giants Facebook, Google, Amazon and Apple and could force them to untie their dominant platforms from their other lines of business. Hostility toward Big Tech has grown in recent years with the belief that its size and swagger have stifled competition, limited consumer choice and raised prices. The bipartisan legislation targets the companies’ structure and points toward breaking them up, a dramatic step for Congress to take against a powerful industry whose products are woven into everyday life. Its backers say it would help ensure lower prices and more choices for consumers, and a fairer playing field for smaller businesses to compete. In two days of heavy, often wonky, debate, the House Judiciary Committee approved the…

Federal law enforcement agencies secretly seek the data of Microsoft customers thousands of times a year, according to congressional testimony Wednesday by a senior executive at the technology company. Tom Burt, Microsoft’s corporate vice president for customer security and trust, told members of the House Judiciary Committee that federal law enforcement in recent years has been presenting the company with between 2,400 to 3,500 secrecy orders a year, or about seven to 10 a day. “Most shocking is just how routine secrecy orders have become when law enforcement targets an American’s email, text messages or other sensitive data stored in the cloud,” said Burt, describing the widespread clandestine surveillance as a major shift from historical norms. The relationship between law enforcement and Big Tech has attracted fresh scrutiny in recent…

Customers wanting to wine, dine and unwind to live music at the City Winery’s flagship restaurant in New York must show proof of a COVID-19 vaccination to get in. But that’s not required at most other dining establishments in the city. And it’s not necessary at other City Winery sites around the U.S. If City Winery tried doing such a thing at its places in Atlanta and Nashville, “we would have no business, because so many people are basically against it,” said CEO Michael Dorf. Across the U.S., many hard-hit businesses eager to return to normal have been reluctant to demand proof of vaccination from customers. And the public and the politicians in many places have made it clear they don’t care for the idea. In fact, far more states…

Talk about a heavy snack. For the first time, astronomers have witnessed a black hole swallowing a neutron star, the most dense object in the universe — all in a split-second gulp. Ten days later they saw the same thing, on the other side of the universe. In both cases, a neutron star — a teaspoon of which would weigh a billion tons — orbits ever closer to that ultimate point of no return, a black hole, until they finally crash together and the neutron star is gone in a gobble. Astronomers witnessed the last 500 orbits before the neutron stars were swallowed, a process that took far less than a minute and briefly generated as much energy as all the visible light in the observable universe. “It was just…

Japanese technology company SoftBank denies it’s pulling the plug on its friendly, talking, bubble-headed Pepper robot. “There is absolutely no change to our Pepper business,” SoftBank Robotics Corp. spokesperson Ai Kitamura said this week. Pepper, introduced seven years ago, is centered around a rentals business, and production is regularly adjusted, the Tokyo-based company said. While production was halted temporarily, Kitamura denied reports that set off speculation Pepper might be “killed.” The company acknowledged the contracts of 330 workers at the Paris division of SoftBank Robotics were being reviewed, but the move was routine and did not spell a death knell for Pepper. If anything, the need for social distancing during the pandemic has boosted demand for robots like Pepper, which sometimes is used to take people’s temperatures in stores. Pepper…

Robinhood Financial will pay nearly $70 million to settle a wide range of allegations, including that it gave customers misleading information and improperly allowed some users to make riskier trades after they lied about their trading experience. The financial penalty is the largest ever ordered by the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, a non-governmental organization that oversees the brokerage industry, and one that “reflects the scope and seriousness of Robinhood’s violations,” said Jessica Hopper, head of FINRA’s department of enforcement. Since its 2014 launch, Robinhood has shaken up the brokerage industry with zero-commission trading and an easy-to-use app that’s drawn a new generation of investors into the market. It already has more than 31 million customers, many of whom were earlier getting left behind as the stock market rose without them.…

Content is king — if you can find it. As streaming services proliferate, it’s becoming more of a challenge to track down your favorite TV shows and blockbuster movies when streaming services can change up their offerings every month. That’s complicating life for those who know what they want to watch, but just don’t know where to locate it. Some hits are practically itinerants. “Batman Begins” and “The Dark Knight,” for instance, bounced around four different services between March 2020 and March 2021 — Netflix, Hulu, HBO Max and Peacock. Some of these services hosted the movies twice in that time according to Reelgood, a service that tracks videos across streaming services. (You can currently find the movies on Hulu and HBO Max.) Want to watch a Harry Potter movie?…

A long-awaited U.S. government report on UFOs released makes at least one thing clear: The truth is still out there. Investigators did not find extraterrestrial links in reviewing 144 sightings of aircraft or other devices apparently flying at mysterious speeds or trajectories. But they drew few other conclusions and instead highlighted the need for better data collection about what’s increasingly seen by Democrats and Republicans as a national security concern. In all but one of the sightings investigated, there was too little information for investigators to even broadly characterize the nature of the incident. There were 18 cases in which witnesses saw “unusual” patterns of movement or flight characteristics, the report said, adding that more analysis was needed to determine if those sightings represented “breakthrough” technology. Long the domain of…

Although General Motors will build Honda’s first two fully electric vehicles for North America, the Japanese automaker plans to change course and manufacture its own later this decade. Company officials say they’re developing their own EV architecture, and after two GM-made EVs go on sale in 2024, Honda will start building its own. “It’s absolutely our intention to produce in our factories,” Honda of America Executive Vice President Dave Gardner said, adding that Honda has developed battery manufacturing expertise from building gas-electric hybrids. “We absolutely intend to utilize that resource.” Honda and GM have been partners on hydrogen fuel cell and electric vehicles. Earlier this year they announced that GM would build one Honda SUV and one Acura SUV using its Ultium-branded electric vehicle architecture and battery system. The company…

There’s some hesitancy from the public regarding the future of self-driving cars; a survey by Autolist says that most shoppers are split about whether having self-driving capability on a vehicle makes it safer. Thankfully, real automated driving vehicles are still years away. But considering that nearly every new car on sale today comes standard or is available with some level of driver-assistance technology, it’s best to stay informed on what these features actually do and whether you would want to pay extra for them. These driving-assist technology features are often referred to as advanced driver-assist systems, or ADAS. Some ADAS are more advanced than others, and capabilities vary from vehicle to vehicle. Let’s be clear: There are no fully automated or self-driving cars for sale today. For example, General Motors’…

A major wireless technology trade fair kicked off in Barcelona this week with scaled-back attendance and beefed-up health and safety measures, changes that reflect the new reality for industry conventions in the pandemic era. Mobile World Congress was canceled at the last minute last year because of COVID-19 concerns. Its 2021 revival makes it one of the few big trade shows so far to attempt a comeback even as the coronavirus pandemic continues to simmer in many parts of the world. The show, known as MWC, is typically a glitzy and well-attended affair, with tech and telecom companies setting up elaborate pavilions to unveil the latest mobile devices, schmooze clients and lobby government officials. But this year, the world’s biggest mobile industry trade show is likely to be a shadow…

In 20 years and 10 movies the “Fast and Furious” series has relentlessly insisted that its saga is really, truly about family. With all due respect to Vin Diesel’s Toretto clan, I must disagree. The “Fast and Furious” movies are really about reaching new nitro-injected realms of absurdity. If you can stomach the macho melodrama, these movies are ridiculous big-screen ballets, with cars shooting out of skyscrapers and airplanes, that at their best are the right kind of stupid. More than family or cars, they’re about the movies’ whiz-bang capacity for ludicrous grandiosity — for stepping on the gas and leaving logic in the rearview. It wasn’t always like this. The “Fast and Furious” movies, which have moved so speedily that their original articles flew out the window somewhere along…

JR Motorsports has had initial conversations about taking its team to NASCAR’s top level, a step up that would be much smoother if it could get its hands on a charter. A charter is essentially the same as a franchise and the 36 that exist guarantee a spot in the 40-car field each week and a larger slice of the money NASCAR contractually owes its participants. Two charters went off the board this month when Kaulig Racing purchased a pair from Spire Motorsports, a team that bought low and stockpiled when potential owners had little interest in NASCAR. Interest has exploded with NASCAR scheduled to debut a new, cost-friendly car next season. Three new teams entered the Cup Series this season and Kaulig’s pending move from Xfinity to Cup caused…

Chinese ride-hailing service Didi says it lost $5.5 billion over the past three years ahead of its U.S. stock market debut Wednesday but it’s highlighting its global reach and investments in developing electric and self-driving cars. The Beijing-headquartered company operates in 16 countries but almost 90% of the 493 million customers who used the service at least once in the past year are in China. Didi Global Inc. planned to raise up to $4 billion by selling 288 million shares on the New York Stock Exchange at $13-$14 each. It said 30% will be spent on technology development, another 30% to expand outside China and 20% on new products. The company founded in 2012 by Will Wei Cheng, a veteran of e-commerce giant Alibaba Group, says it aims to become…