| Serbian Student's Android Phone Compromised By Exploit From Cellebrite Mar 1st 2025, 03:30, by BeauHD An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: Amnesty International on Friday said it determined that a zero-day exploit sold by controversial exploit vendor Cellebrite was used to compromise the phone of a Serbian student who had been critical of that country's government. [...] The chain exploited a series of vulnerabilities in device drivers the Linux kernel uses to support USB hardware. "This new case provides further evidence that the authorities in Serbia have continued their campaign of surveillance of civil society in the aftermath of our report, despite widespread calls for reform, from both inside Serbia and beyond, as well as an investigation into the misuse of its product, announced by Cellebrite," authors of the report wrote. Amnesty International first discovered evidence of the attack chain last year while investigating a separate incident outside of Serbia involving the same Android lockscreen bypass. [...] The report said that one of the vulnerabilities, tracked as CVE-2024-53104, was patched earlier this month with the release of the February 2025 Android Security Bulletin. Two other vulnerabilities -- CVE-2024-53197 and CVE-2024-50302 -- have been patched upstream in the Linux kernel but have not yet been incorporated into Android. Forensic traces identified in Amnesty International's analysis of the compromised phone showed that the Serbian authorities tried to install an unknown application after the device had been unlocked. The report authors said the installation of apps on Cellebrite-compromised devices was consistent with earlier cases the group has uncovered in which spyware tracked as NoviSpy spyware were installed. As part of the attack, the USB port of the targeted phone was connected to various peripherals during the initial stages. In later stages, the peripherals repeatedly connected to the phone so they could "disclose kernel memory and groom kernel memory as part of the exploitation." The people analyzing the phone said the peripherals were likely special-purpose devices that emulated video or sound devices connecting to the targeted device. The 23-year-old student who owned the phone regularly participates in the ongoing student protests in Belgrade. Any Android users who have yet to install the February patch batch should do so as soon as possible.   Read more of this story at Slashdot. | | Google's Taara Hopes To Usher in a New Era of Internet Powered by Light Mar 1st 2025, 02:10, by msmash Alphabet's X division has developed a silicon photonic chip for its Taara project, which transmits internet via laser beams instead of fiber optic cables. The system delivers 20Gbps through "light bridges" that establish line-of-sight connections between transceiver units. The second-generation technology miniaturizes previous mechanical components -- including gimbals, mirrors, and lenses -- into solid-state circuitry the size of a fingernail. This chip enables a single laser transmitter to potentially pair with multiple receptors, significantly reducing costs from the current ~$30,000 per bridge setup. Taara has already demonstrated real-world viability by connecting Brazzaville and Kinshasa across the Congo River, providing the latter with five-fold cheaper internet access, and supplementing bandwidth at Coachella 2024. Project leader Mahesh Krishnaswamy claims Taara can deliver "10, if not 100 times more bandwidth" than Starlink in dense areas. X's Astro Teller suggests this technology could form the foundation for 7G networks as radio frequency bands become increasingly congested. Taara will soon "graduate" from X and seek external funding, with Alphabet maintaining a significant stake. Further reading: Official blog post. Read more of this story at Slashdot. | | 3D Software Company Autodesk Cuts 1,350 Jobs To Boost AI Investment Mar 1st 2025, 01:30, by BeauHD Autodesk said it would cut 1,350 employees, or about 9% of its workforce, as part of a pivot to the cloud and artificial intelligence. Fast Company reports: Companies across sectors such as architecture, engineering, construction, and product design are making extensive use of Autodesk's 3D design solutions, with the software maker's artificial intelligence and machine learning capabilities further driving spending on its products. Autodesk saw a 23% jump in total billings to $2.11 billion in the fourth quarter ended January 31. The company's international operations have particularly shown strength, while analysts have also noted that the company was outpacing peers in the manufacturing sector, driven by the performance of its "Fusion" design software. Read more of this story at Slashdot. | | Apple Accused of Misleading Consumers With Apple Watch 'Carbon Neutral' Claims Mar 1st 2025, 00:50, by BeauHD Apple is facing a class action lawsuit alleging it misled consumers by falsely claiming certain Apple Watches were carbon neutral, as the carbon offset projects it relied on did not effectively reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The Verge reports: Apple said in 2023 that "select case and band combinations" of its Apple Watch Series 9, Apple Watch Ultra 2, and Apple Watch SE would be the company's first carbon neutral devices. The suit was filed on behalf of anyone who bought those watches. It alleges that the products were not really carbon neutral because they relied on faulty offset projects that didn't actually reduce the company's greenhouse gas pollution. [...] The company's carbon neutral claims were false, and the seven plaintiffs would not have purchased the Apple Watches or paid as much for them had they known that, the lawsuit alleges. "Apple's false advertising may lead [consumers] to choose its products over genuinely sustainable alternatives," the complaint (PDF) filed in a California federal court on Wednesday says. Apple is standing by its assertions. "We are proud of our carbon neutral products, which are the result of industry-leading innovation in clean energy and low-carbon design," Apple spokesperson Sean Redding said in an email. Redding says the company reduced Apple Watch emissions by more than 75 percent. The company focused on cutting pollution from materials, electricity, and transportation used to make the watches, in part by getting more of its suppliers to switch to clean energy. To deal with the remaining pollution, Redding says Apple invests in "nature-based projects to remove hundreds of thousands of metric tons of carbon from the air." That's where the new lawsuit finds problems. To offset their emissions, many companies buy carbon credits from forestry projects that represent tons of planet-heating carbon dioxide that trees and soil naturally trap. Apple primarily purchased credits from the Chyulu Hills project in Kenya and the Guinan Project in China, the suit says. It alleges that neither of the projects met a basic standard for carbon offsets, which is that they capture additional CO2 that would not otherwise have been sequestered had Apple not paid to support the project. Read more of this story at Slashdot. | | Microsoft Begins Turning Off uBlock Origin, Other Extensions In Edge Mar 1st 2025, 00:30, by BeauHD Microsoft Edge is following Chrome's lead by disabling uBlock Origin and other Manifest V2-based extensions in its browser. Neowin reports: The latest Edge Canary version started disabling Manifest V2-based extensions with the following message: "This extension is no longer supported. Microsoft Edge recommends that you remove it." Although the browser turns off old extensions without asking, you can still make them work by clicking "Manage extension" and toggling it back (you will have to acknowledge another prompt). Google started phasing out Manifest V2 extensions in June 2024, and it has a clear roadmap for the process. Microsoft's documentation, however, still says "TBD," so the exact dates are not known yet. This leads to some speculating about the situation being one of "unexpected changes" coming from Chromium. Either way, sooner or later, Microsoft will ditch MV2-based extensions, so get ready as we wait for Microsoft to shine some light on its plans. Another thing worth noting is that the change does not appear to be affecting Edge's stable release or Beta/Dev Channels. For now, only Canary versions disable uBlock Origin and other MV2 extensions, leaving users a way to toggle them back on. Also, the uBlock Origin is still available in the Edge Add-ons store, which recently received a big update. Read more of this story at Slashdot. | | Benioff Says Salesforce Won't Hire Engineers This Year Due To AI Mar 1st 2025, 00:10, by msmash Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff said his firm, San Francisco's largest private employer, does not plan to hire engineers this year because of the success of AI agents created and used by the company. From a report: "My message to CEOs right now is that we are the last generation to manage only humans," Benioff said Wednesday on Salesforce's earnings call, indicating that companies of the future will have hybrid human and digital workforces. Benioff added that Salesforce's mission is to become "the No. 1 digital labor provider, period" to other companies. Read more of this story at Slashdot. | | OpenAI Plans To Integrate Sora's Video Generator Into ChatGPT Feb 28th 2025, 23:30, by BeauHD An anonymous reader quotes a report from TechCrunch: OpenAI intends to eventually integrate its AI video generation tool, Sora, directly into its popular consumer chatbot app, ChatGPT, company leaders said during a Friday office hours session on Discord. Today, Sora is only available through a dedicated web app OpenAI launched in December, which lets users access the AI video model of the same name to generate up to twenty-second-long cinematic clips. However, OpenAI's product lead for Sora, Rohan Sahai, said the company has plans to put Sora in more places, and expand what Sora can create. [...] OpenAI may be trying to attract users to ChatGPT by letting them generate Sora videos from the chatbot. Putting Sora in ChatGPT could also incentivize users to upgrade to ChatGPT's premium subscription tiers, which may offer higher video generation limits. One of the reasons OpenAI launched Sora as a separate web app was to maintain ChatGPT's simplicity, Sahai explained during the office hours. Since its launch, OpenAI has expanded Sora's web experience, creating more ways for users to browse Sora-generated videos from the community. Sahai also said OpenAI "would love to build" a standalone mobile app for Sora, noting that the Sora team is actively looking for mobile engineers. OpenAI also plans to expand Sora's generation capabilities to images, letting users create more photorealistic images than what's currently possible with OpenAI's DALL-E3 model. Read more of this story at Slashdot. | | An Appeals Court May Kill a GNU GPL Software License Feb 28th 2025, 22:50, by BeauHD The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals is set to review a California district court's ruling in Neo4j v. PureThink, which upheld Neo4j's right to modify the GNU AGPLv3 with additional binding terms. If the appellate court affirms this decision, it could set a precedent allowing licensors to impose unremovable restrictions on open-source software, potentially undermining the enforceability of GPL-based licenses and threatening the integrity of the open-source ecosystem. The Register reports: The GNU AGPLv3 is a free and open source software (FOSS) license largely based on the GNU GPLv3, both of which are published by the Free Software Foundation (FSF). Neo4j provided database software under the AGPLv3, then tweaked the license, leading to legal battles over forks of the software. The AGPLv3 includes language that says any added restrictions or requirements are removable, meaning someone could just file off Neo4j's changes to the usage and distribution license, reverting it back to the standard AGPLv3, which the biz has argued and successfully fought against in that California district court. Now the matter, the validity of that modified FOSS license, is before an appeals court in the USA. "I don't think the community realizes that if the Ninth Circuit upholds the lower court's ruling, it won't just kill GPLv3," PureThink's John Mark Suhy told The Register. "It will create a dangerous legal precedent that could be used to undermine all open-source licenses, allowing licensors to impose unexpected restrictions and fundamentally eroding the trust that makes open source possible." Perhaps equally concerning is the fact that Suhy, founder and CTO of PureThink and iGov (the two firms sued by Neo4j), and presently CTO of IT consultancy Greystones Group, is defending GPL licenses on his own, pro se, without the help of the FSF, founded by Richard Stallman, creator of the GNU General Public License. "I'm actually doing everything pro se because I used up all my savings to fight it in the lower court," said Suhy. "I'm surprised the Free Software Foundation didn't care too much about it. They always had an excuse about not having the money for it. Luckily the Software Freedom Conservancy came in and helped out there." Read more of this story at Slashdot. | | Intel Delays $28 Billion Ohio Chip Factory To 2030 Feb 28th 2025, 22:10, by BeauHD According to The Columbia Dispatch, Intel's promised $28 billion semiconductor project in central Ohio has been delayed again until 2030, with operations beginning sometime shortly thereafter in either 2030 or 2031. From the report: By the time it opens, Intel's first factory will have faced at least five or six years of delays, as it was originally scheduled to begin operating in 2025. Intel's second Ohio factory won't be completed until at least 2031 and will begin running in 2032, according to the company. The new timeline comes as Intel continues to struggle financially, which was a key factor in the latest delay for the company's Ohio factories. The company was alerting its employees of the delays in a message Friday. The changes were made so Intel can align its factory operation with market demand and better "manage our capital responsibly," Naga Chandrasekaran, executive vice president, chief global operations officer and general manager of Intel Foundry Manufacturing wrote in a message to workers. The changes will ensure Intel's Ohio fabs will be finished in a "financially responsible manner that sets up Ohio One for success," Chandrasekaran wrote. "I wanted to be upfront and transparent with you all about our current plan. In no way does this diminish our long-term commitment to Ohio," Chandrasekaran wrote. "(W)e will continue to scale our hiring as we approach our operational dates. Intel is proud to call Ohio home, and we remain excited about our future here." Read more of this story at Slashdot. | | Commercials Are Still Too Loud, Say 'Thousands' of Recent FCC Complaints Feb 28th 2025, 21:30, by BeauHD An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: Thousands" of complaints about the volume of TV commercials have flooded the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) in recent years. Despite the FCC requiring TV stations, cable operators, and satellite providers to ensure that commercials don't bring a sudden spike in decibels, complaints around loud commercials "took a troubling jump" in 2024, the government body said on Thursday. Under The Commercial Advertisement Loudness Mitigation (CALM) Act, broadcast, cable, and satellite TV providers are required to ensure that commercials "have the same average volume as the programs they accompany," per the FCC. The FCC's rules about the volume of commercials took effect in December 2012. The law also requires linear TV providers to use the Advanced Television Systems Committee's (ATSC's) recommended practices. The practices include guidance around production, post production, metadata systems usage, and controlling dynamic range. If followed, the recommendations "result in consistency in loudness and avoidance of signal clipping," per the ATSC [PDF]. The guidance reads: "If all programs and commercials were produced at a consistent average loudness, and if the loudness of the mix is preserved through the production, distribution, and delivery chain, listeners would not be subjected to annoying changes in loudness within and between programs." As spotted by PC Mag, the FCC claimed this week that The Calm Act initially reduced complaints about commercials aggressively blaring from TVs. However, the agency is seeing an uptick in grievances. The FCC said it received "approximately" 750 complaints in 2022, 825 in 2023, and "at least" 1,700 in 2024 [PDF]. Since The Calm Act regulates a commercial's average loudness, some advertisers may be skirting the spirit of the law by making commercials very loud at the start (to get viewers' attention) before quieting down for the rest of the ad. In response to growing complaints, the FCC is reexamining its rules and this week announced that it's seeking comment from "consumers and industry on the extent to which The CALM Act rules are effective." The FCC is also asking people to weigh in on what future actions the FCC, the TV industry, or standard developers could take. The FCC is considering whether to extend the Calm Act to online streaming services, which are increasingly offering plans with ad-supported models and live event broadcasts. Read more of this story at Slashdot. | | Mozilla Responds To Backlash Over New Terms, Saying It's Not Using People's Data for AI Feb 28th 2025, 20:22, by msmash Mozilla has denied allegations that its new Firefox browser terms of service allow it to harvest user data for artificial intelligence training, following widespread criticism of the recently updated policy language. The controversy erupted after Firefox introduced terms that grant Mozilla "a nonexclusive, royalty-free, worldwide license to use that information" when users upload content through the browser, prompting competitor Brave Software's CEO Brendan Eich to suggest a business pivot toward data monetization. "These changes are not driven by a desire by Mozilla to use people's data for AI or sell it to advertisers," Mozilla spokesperson Kenya Friend-Daniel told TechCrunch. "Our ability to use data is still limited by what we disclose in the Privacy Notice." The company clarified that its AI features operate locally on users' devices and don't send content data to Mozilla. Any data shared with advertisers is provided only on a "de-identified or aggregated basis," according to the spokesperson. Mozilla explained it used specific legal terms -- "nonexclusive," "royalty-free," and "worldwide" -- because Firefox is free, available globally, and allows users to maintain control of their own data. Read more of this story at Slashdot. | | Google's Sergey Brin Urges Workers To the Office at Least Every Weekday Feb 28th 2025, 18:50, by msmash Google co-founder Sergey Brin has urged employees working on the company's Gemini AI products to be in the office "at least every weekday" [non-paywalled source] and suggested "60 hours a week is the sweet spot of productivity," according to an internal memo cited by The New York Times. The directive comes as Brin warned that "competition has accelerated immensely and the final race to A.G.I. is afoot," referring to artificial general intelligence, when machines match or surpass human intelligence. "I think we have all the ingredients to win this race, but we are going to have to turbocharge our efforts," Brin wrote in the Wednesday evening memo. The guidance does not alter Google's official policy requiring employees to work in-office three days weekly. Brin, who returned to Google following ChatGPT's 2022 launch, also criticized staff who "put in the bare minimum," calling them "highly demoralizing to everyone else." Read more of this story at Slashdot. | | US Workers See AI-Induced Productivity Growth, Fed Survey Shows Feb 28th 2025, 18:17, by msmash Workers reported saving a substantial number of work hours by using generative AI, according to research conducted by the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, along with Vanderbilt and Harvard universities. From a report: The researchers, drawing from what they identified as the first nationally representative survey of generative AI adoption, measured the impact of generative AI on work productivity by how much workers used the technology and how intensely. They found users are saving meaningful amounts of time. "On average, workers are 33% more productive in each hour that they use generative AI," the paper found. Among respondents that used generative AI in the previous week, 21% said it saved them four hours or more in that week, 20% reported three hours, 26% said two hours and 33% reported an hour or less. Read more of this story at Slashdot. | | DeepMind CEO Says AGI Definition Has Been 'Watered Down' Feb 28th 2025, 17:33, by msmash Google DeepMind CEO Demis Hassabis says the definition of artificial general intelligence is being "watered down," creating an illusion of faster progress toward this technological milestone. "There's quite a long way, in my view, before we get to AGI," Hassabis said. "The timelines are shrinking because the definition of AGI is being watered down, in my opinion." DeepMind defines AGI as "AI systems that are at least as capable as humans at most cognitive tasks," while OpenAI has historically described it as a "highly autonomous system that outperforms humans at most economically valuable work." OpenAI CEO Sam Altman recently declared his team is "confident we know how to build AGI," while modifying his personal definition to an AI "system that can tackle increasingly complex problems, at human level, in many fields." Hassabis suggested industry hype might be financially motivated: "There is a lot of hype for various reasons," he said, including perhaps "that people need to raise money." Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella separately dismissed AGI milestones as "nonsensical benchmark hacking," preferring economic impact measurements. Read more of this story at Slashdot. | | President Trump: UK Encryption Policy 'Something You Hear About With China' Feb 28th 2025, 16:40, by msmash President Trump has directly criticized the UK government's approach to encryption, comparing recent actions to those of China. Speaking to The Spectator, Trump said he confronted UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer about the Home Office's request for "backdoor access" to encrypted iCloud data, which led Apple to remove its Advanced Data Protection feature from British services entirely. "We told them you can't do this... That's incredible. That's something, you know, that you hear about with China," Trump said after his meeting with Starmer. The remarks come as the Trump administration has directed Treasury and Commerce officials to examine UK tech regulations, including the Online Safety Act, for potential free speech violations and discrimination against US companies. Read more of this story at Slashdot. | |
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