Topic: SECURITY - on May 29, 2016 at 12:15:00 PM CEST
Tor Browser and Tails Version Fingerprint
Tor Browser and Tails version fingerprinting in Javascript (and some CSS). The PoC can also detect if Tor Browser is running on a Mac OS X. Works up to medium-high privacy settings.
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Topic: SECURITY - on May 29, 2016 at 12:12:00 PM CEST
How the Internet works: Submarine fiber, brains in jars, and coaxial cables
Ah, there you are. That didn't take too long, surely? Just a click or a tap and, if you’ve some 21st century connectivity, you landed on this page in a trice.
But how does it work? Have you ever thought about how that cat picture actually gets from a server in Oregon to your PC in London? We’re not simply talking about the wonders of TCP/IP or pervasive Wi-Fi hotspots, though those are vitally important as well. No, we’re talking about the big infrastructure: the huge submarine cables, the vast landing sites and data centres with their massively redundant power systems, and the elephantine, labyrinthine last-mile networks that actually hook billions of us to the Internet.
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Topic: SCIENCE - on May 29, 2016 at 12:04:00 PM CEST
List of organisms named after famous people
In biological nomenclature, organisms often receive scientific names that honor a person. A taxon (e.g. species or genus; plural: taxa) named in honor of another entity is an eponymous taxon, and names specifically honoring a person or persons are known as patronyms. Scientific names are generally formally published in peer-reviewed journal articles or larger monographs along with descriptions of the named taxa and ways to distinguish them from other taxa. Following rules of Latin grammar, species or subspecies names derived from a man's name often end in -i or -ii if named for an individual, and -orum if named for a group of men or mixed-sex group, such as a family. Similarly, those named for a woman often end in -ae, or -arum for two or more women.
Anomphalus jaggerius Snail Mick Jagger Bumba lennoni Spider John Lennon Funkotriplogynium iagobadius Mite James Brown Montypythonoides riversleighensis Extinct reptile Monty Python Psephophorus terrypratchetti Turtle Terry Pratchett Tetramorium adamsi Ant Douglas Adams
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Topic: AUSTRIA - on May 29, 2016 at 12:01:00 PM CEST
Privacy whiz Max Schrems set to challenge other big firms
Tech industry be warned. Privacy campaigner Max Schrems plans on setting up an NGO to enforce people's rights. The Austrian, whose case against Facebook Ireland helped unravel a data-sharing pact between the EU and the US known as Safe Harbour, now has his eyes set on taking on others who flaunt the rules. Edward Snowden, the former NSA agent who blew the lid off US-led mass surveillance, said last year Schrems had "changed the world for the better" when Safe Harbour ended up on the scrap heap of bad EU legislation. Today, Schrems, whose crowdfunded legal campaign against Facebook started when he was only a 24-year old student, is mulling a new master-plan.
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Topic: TV - on May 28, 2016 at 12:09:00 PM CEST
TTIP, CETA und Freihandel - Die Anstalt
... wirklich, was diese größenwahnsinnigen Besetzer da in der Anstalt verzapfen? Das fragen immer wieder viele verunsicherte Zuschauer. Müssen wir womöglich unser Weltbild nachbessern, und wie sollen wir uns das eigentlich leisten? Die Anstaltsleitung teilt Ihnen mit: Zur Beruhigung besteht keinerlei Anlass, es ist alles genau so gemeint, wie es nicht gesagt wurde. Wenn Sie das nicht glauben können, überzeugen Sie sich selbst bei folgenden anderen Quellen, von denen wir uns alle gleichermaßen distanzieren. Wir sind ja schließlich nicht wahnsinnig ...
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Topic: NEWS - on May 28, 2016 at 11:37:00 AM CEST
Presserat: Abdruck des Erdogan- "Schmähgedichts" kein Ethikverstoß
UETD-Beschwerde gegen "Österreich" zurückgewiesen: Kein Verstoß gegen Menschenwürde oder den Persönlichkeitsschutz – Einbettung des Gedichtes in Artikel entscheidend
Wien – Der Presserat sieht in der Veröffentlichung des Böhmermann-Schmähgedichtes über den türkischen Präsidenten Recep Tayyip Erdogan in der Tageszeitung "Österreich" keinen medienethischen Verstoß. Die Union Europäisch-Türkischer Demokraten Österreich (UETD) hatte sich an den Presserat gewandt und den Artikel "Erdogan will jetzt Komiker einsperren" kritisiert.
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Topic: POLITIK - on May 28, 2016 at 11:35:00 AM CEST
Secret New Internet Rules in the Trade in Services Agreement
This week new materials from the Trade in Services Agreement (TISA) were released by Wikileaks, revealing that negotiators from around the world have been continuing to craft new rules that will affect all Internet users, without public scrutiny or consultation. One of the biggest surprises that dropped is a document containing new proposals, mostly from the United States, that will apply to all services. Some of these new provisions are relevant to the Internet and digital rights: Article X.3 would prohibit a country from giving preferential treatment to Internet content based on its origin or the nationality of those who created it. This is directed at policies such as the recent European proposal to require Netflix in Europe to carry a certain proportion of European-produced content, mirroring similar existing rules for television broadcasters. We tend to agree that any policy that erects artificial national or regional walls around Internet services is against users' interests. However, seeking to force new international rules on this topic in a closed trade agreement is both quixotic and exclusionary. There is very little likelihood that the other TiSA parties will accept this without exceptions broad enough to swallow the rule. This particularly applies to Europe, where the protection of local cultural diversity, including through film and television quotas, is unwavering. More importantly, any new rules on Internet content quotas would impact the interests of many stakeholders who are excluded from the TISA discussions, including those of creators, consumers, and platforms.
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Topic: NEWS - on May 25, 2016 at 2:32:00 PM CEST
Trade in Services Agreement - wikileaks
Today, Wednesday, 25 May 2016, 11:30am CEST, WikiLeaks releases new secret documents from the huge Trade in Services Agreement (TiSA) which is being negotiated by the US, EU and 22 other countries that account for 2/3rds of global GDP. This release includes a previously unknown annex to the TiSA core chapter on "State Owned Enterprises" (SOEs), which imposes unprecedented restrictions on SOEs and will force majority owned SOEs to operate like private sector businesses. This corporatisation of public services - to nearly the same extent as demanded by the recently signed TPP - is a next step to privatisation of SOEs on the neoliberal agenda behind the "Big Three" (TTIP,TiSA,TPP).
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Topic: logisch - on May 25, 2016 at 2:17:00 PM CEST
The Open Data Delusion
I first met Gail Ramster in 2010 at an event about the release of London-wide Open Data by the Greater London Authority. A researcher on “toilet usability,” she was trying to gather public data to compile a list of toilets accessible to elderly people. Six years later I met Gail again, this time at her office at the Royal College of Art, to discuss her experience. The past 5 years have been for me a whirlwind of Open Data advocacy; first working to increase awareness of Open Data in academia, then as a ministerial adviser in the now defunct Open Data User Group – or ODUG, an advisory panel at the UK Government Cabinet Office. ODUG operated in 2012-2015 to help the Government prioritize data releases, assign funding, and produce policy recommendations. In those three years, one of the most curious things I learned was that toilets are among the most requested datasets. A project to allow Local Authorities to release toilet locations was one of the recipients of the Release of Data Fund (see: Local Government Data Incentive Scheme), which we administered. When I tell Gail that I believe toilet data is representative of the whole Open Data parable, she laughs: “It’s all very fragmented.” In fact, despite a lot of work by and with the Government, in 2016, we still have little assurance about data quality, frequency of the releases, reliability of schemas, conflicting standards, and teething issues with licensing.
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Topic: logisch - on May 25, 2016 at 2:15:00 PM CEST
Towel Day
Towel Day is an annual celebration on the 25th of May, as a tribute to the late author Douglas Adams (1952-2001). On that day, fans around the universe carry a towel in his honour.
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Topic: NEWS english - on May 21, 2016 at 4:39:00 PM CEST
Startup To Create Man-Made Meteor Shower For 2020 Olympics
For some countries, a massive pyrotechnic display would do, but not Japan. Japanese startup company Star-ALE wants to create a man-made meteor shower for the 2020 Olympics in Tokyo. The artificial meteor shower called Sky Canvas light show will allow viewers to enjoy it from an area of more than 120 miles. And for that to happen, the pyrotechnics will not be set up on the ground. Star-ALE is taking it to space.
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Topic: History - on May 21, 2016 at 2:23:00 PM CEST
That wasn't a Mayan lost city, just another example of the culture of hype
I t was a good story while it lasted: A 15-year-old boy discovered a lost city by theorizing that a modern star map would correlate with ancient Mayan settlements. It seemed to fit the common understanding of the Maya as peaceful stargazers, centuries ahead of their time in astronomical observation and deeply mystical. It only makes sense they’d plan their cities to align with constellations. The teenage scientist, William Gadoury, of Saint-Jean-de-Matha, Quebec, overlaid constellations and known Maya cities. When he found a gap where it seemed a settlement ought to have been, he consulted satellite imagery and found shapes the looked man-made. Suddenly, the lost city story went viral.
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