Caller ID will be verified when AT&T and Comcast customers call each other.
Enlarge/ The AT&T logo is displayed at a retail store in Washington, DC, on Monday, March 21, 2011. (credit: Getty Images | Bloomberg)
AT&T and Comcast today said they've completed a successful cross-network test of a new Caller ID authentication system, and they plan to roll out the technology to consumers later this year.
AT&T and Comcast are among the phone providers implementing the new "SHAKEN" and "STIR" protocols, which use digital certificates to verify that Caller ID numbers aren't being spoofed.
Today's AT&T/Comcast announcement said the carriers completed "an exchange of authenticated calls between two separate providers' voice networks that is believed to be the nation's first." They called the test an "anti-robocalling fraud milestone."
“This really isn’t a five-year decision. It’s more like a 10 or a 15-year decision.”
Enlarge/ A United Launch Alliance Delta IV Heavy lifts the NROL-71 payload on Jan. 19, 2019. (credit: United Launch Alliance)
Within the next 10 days, the US Air Force may issue an opportunity for rocket companies to bid on contracts for about 25 launches between 2022 and 2026. Although a “request for proposals” may not sound all that provocative, this particular government solicitation is filled with intrigue—and will have major implications for all of the big US rocket companies.
At present, United Launch Alliance (ULA) and SpaceX launch rockets for the Air Force, lofting powerful spy cameras, communication satellites and other sensitive payloads into various orbits for the government. In recent years, the military has sought to modernize its contractor base for the coming decade, encouraging new launch competitors and new ideas. This forthcoming solicitation for launch contracts in the mid-2020s, however, may effectively end that effort.
It was only five months ago, in October, that the Air Force announced $2.25 billion in “Launch Services Agreements” to be split among ULA (Vulcan rocket), Northrop Grumman (Omega), and Blue Origin (New Glenn). The funds were provided so that each of those companies could develop large, modern rockets and build the launch facilities needed to support military payloads. Over the first year of those awards, each company will receive the first $181 million of their individual awards. (SpaceX, somewhat controversially, did not receive an award. This is partly because the Air Force believes the company's Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy rockets can meet its needs.)
It's clear that Microsoft is in the very final stages of development of Windows 10 version 1903, the April 2019 Update. The fast distribution ring has seen two builds arrive this week after two last week, bringing with them no new features but a slowly whittled-down bug list following the development pattern we've seen in previous updates. In the past, the company has tried to release Windows 10 feature upgrades on Patch Tuesday, the second Tuesday of each month, meaning there's just under three weeks left to go.
A little alarmingly, a couple of long-standing issues with the release still appear to be unresolved. A green-screen-of-death error caused when games with BattlEye anti-cheat software are used has been a feature of the 1903 previews for many months, and Microsoft is still listing it as unresolved. The scope and impact of this bug was so significant that the slow distribution ring didn't receive a preview of 1903 for much of its development process; Microsoft felt that it was too likely to affect too many people to be usable. This is eminently plausible, as BattlEye is used by PUBG and Fortnite, among other games. The company finally relented in February, pushing out a new build on the slow ring but blacklisting any systems with the offending third-party software.
The bug was first listed as a known issue with build 18298, released on December 10 last year. Microsoft says it's working with BattlEye to resolve the problem, but there has been no visible progress so far. BattlEye boasts of using a kernel-mode component as part of its anti-cheat software. Running in the kernel means that it's harder for cheat software to hide from or otherwise interfere with what BattlEye does, but with this comes the temptation to mess with operating system data structures and functions that aren't documented, which then leads to system crashes when the operating system is updated.
Cable lobbyists don't want to be called cable lobbyists anymore. The nation's top two cable industry lobby groups have both dropped the word "cable" from their names. But the lobby groups' core mission—the fight against regulation of cable networks—remains unchanged.
The National Cable & Telecommunications Association (NCTA) got things started in 2016 when it renamed itself NCTA-The Internet & Television Association, keeping the initialism but dropping the words it stood for. The group was also known as the National Cable Television Association between 1968 and 2001.
The American Cable Association (ACA) is the nation's other major cable lobby. While NCTA represents the biggest companies like Comcast and Charter, the ACA represents small and mid-size cable operators. Today, the ACA announced that it is now called America's Communications Association or "ACA Connects," though the ACA's website still uses the americancable.org domain name.
Im Landkreis Börde geht das Großprojekt Glasfaserausbau der ARGE Breitband und DNS:NET weiter. Nach Problemen wegen fehlender Tiefbaukapazität wird jetzt ausgebaut. (Glasfaser, Internet)
Im Landkreis Börde geht das Großprojekt Glasfaserausbau der ARGE Breitband und DNS:NET weiter. Nach Problemen wegen fehlender Tiefbaukapazität wird jetzt ausgebaut. (Glasfaser, Internet)
Plenty of companies have laptops that transform into tablets. But Compal’s DuoFlip is something a little… different. At first glance it looks like a normal notebook, and you can use it like one by lifting the lid the way you would on any ot…
Plenty of companies have laptops that transform into tablets. But Compal’s DuoFlip is something a little… different. At first glance it looks like a normal notebook, and you can use it like one by lifting the lid the way you would on any other laptop PC. Push the screen back 360 degrees and you can […]
All 24 movies from the iTunes exclusive 4K “James Bond Collection” have leaked online. This is further evidence to suggest that pirates have found a way to decrypt 4K source files from the iTunes store. How, exactly, remains a mystery.
The ongoing battle between copyright holders and pirates is often described as a cat and mouse game, especially when it comes to content protection.
While most regular releases can be ripped or decrypted nowadays, 4K content remains a challenge to breach.
Up until a few days ago, pirate sites had never seen a decrypted 4K download from Apple’s video platform. However, a flurry of recent leaks, including many titles from the iTunes-exclusive “James Bond Collection,” suggests that the flood gates are now open.
It all started earlier this month ago when a pirated 4K copy of Aquaman surfaced online. The file is a so-called “Web” release, also known as WEB-DL in P2P circles. This means that it’s a decrypted copy of the original source file. These were never seen before for 4K releases.
Because the Aquaman release was only available on iTunes in this quality at the time, the most likely conclusion was that Apple’s platform was the source. However, based on just one single leak, it was tricky to draw strong conclusions.
The news quickly spread among pirate videophiles though, with some hoping that this would lead to the release of more exclusive titles. The iTunes exclusive James Bond 4K collection, for example.
“Maybe we will be able to get the 007 catalogue off iTunes? In any way, exciting times!” a commenter on Reddit noted. This is exactly what happened.
In less than a week, all 24 films from iTunes’ “James Bond Collection” surfaced online as 2160p WEB-DLs . It started with a copy of the latest Bond movie “Spectre”, all the way to the earliest titles, including “Dr. No” and “From Russia With Love”.
The leaked movies originate from the DEFLATE release group and are marked as ‘INTERNAL’ releases.
Some of the 007 releases.
These 4K releases are exclusive to iTunes, which means that the release group likely has access to some kind of vulnerability or breach at the video platform and/or Apple TV hardware, which allows it to decrypt the videos’ source files.
In theory, it’s also possible that there’s an ‘inside’ leak with access to unencrypted source files, but that seems less likely.
The James Bond WEB-DL leaks are not the only iTunes-linked 4K titles that have appeared online either. We already mentioned Aquaman and Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse previously, and this week pirated 4K copies of Bumblebee and The Mule came out as well.
Interestingly, DEFLATE also released 4K WEB-DL copies of the first two episodes of the new TV-series “Now Apocalypse.” This title, combined with the release timing, are linked to Starzplay via Amazon. Since this is just one title, it is harder to confirm the source with certainty.
In the past, we have seen other 4K leaks from streaming platforms such as Netflix and Amazon, but these were WEBRips, which are captured and encoded, instead of directly downloaded from the source file.
How the release group pulled this off remains a mystery for now. We contacted Apple to find out whether the company has any further details, but at the time of publication, we have yet to hear back.
Emissions from downstream use of fossil fuels must be estimated, judge said.
Enlarge/ A natural gas facility stands on the Pinedale Anticline on May 3, 2018 in Pinedale, Wyoming. (Photo by Melanie Stetson Freeman/The Christian Science Monitor via Getty Images) (credit: Getty Images)
On Tuesday, a federal judge wrote that the Department of the Interior must complete a thorough climate change analysis when considering leasing public land for oil and gas extraction.
The opinion included an order to halt all new oil and gas leases on more than 300,000 acres of publicly managed land in Wyoming until the DOI's Bureau of Land Management (BLM) can complete a proper review.
The case was initially brought in 2016 in the US District Court for the District of Columbia against former President Barack Obama's DOI. The plaintiffs, WildEarth Guardians and Physicians for Social Responsibility, argued that the DOI made oil and gas lease sales in Colorado, Utah, and Wyoming without taking into account the "direct, indirect, and cumulative" impacts to the climate that drilling would have.
On Monday, Devin Nunes' cow was an obscure Twitter account with around 1,200 followers. Then Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Calif.) filed a lawsuit demanding that Twitter and several Twitter accounts—including the user behind the pseudonymous cow—pay him $250 million for the "pain, insult, embarrassment, humiliation, emotional distress and mental suffering, and injury to his personal and professional reputations" caused by their tweets.
Now, Devin Nunes' cow has more than 420,000 Twitter followers—that's more than Nunes himself, who has 395,000 followers.
It's a beautiful example of the Streisand Effect. Nunes appears to have filed the lawsuit in part to raise his own profile within the conservative movement, as the lawsuit was peppered with gratuitous swipes at the Democratic Party, Fusion GPS, and other high-profile villains in the conservative pantheon.
She wrote 141 exemptions since 2015. The second highest number was 26.
Enlarge/ A nurse prepares to administer the measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) vaccine as well as a vaccine used to help prevent the diseases of diphtheria, pertussis, tetanus, and polio at Children's Primary Care Clinic in Minneapolis, MN. (credit: Getty | The Washington Post)
A single San Diego doctor wrote nearly a third of the area’s medical vaccination exemptions since 2015, according to an investigation by the local nonprofit news organization Voice of San Diego.
The revelation follows growing concern that anti-vaccine parents are flocking to doctors willing to write dubious medical exemptions to circumvent the state’s vaccination requirements. Since California banned exemptions based on personal beliefs in 2015, medical exemptions have tripled in the state. The rise has led some areas to have vaccination rates below the levels necessary to curb the spread of vaccine-preventable illnesses. Moreover, it signals a worrying trend for other states working to crack down on exemptions and thwart outbreaks of vaccine-preventable diseases. There are currently six outbreaks of measles across the country.
Medical vaccination exemptions are intended for the relatively few people who have medical conditions that prevent them from receiving vaccines safely. That includes people who are on long-term immunosuppressive therapy or those who are immunocompromised, such as those with HIV or those who have had severe, life-threatening allergic reactions (e.g. anaphylaxis) to previous immunizations. Such patients typically receive medical exemptions incidentally during their medical care. But some doctors are providing evaluations specifically to determine if a patient qualifies for an exemption and granting exemptions using criteria not based on medical evidence. Some doctors are even charging fees for these questionable exemption evaluations—including the doctor in San Diego, Tara Zandvliet.
Im Landkreis Börde geht das Großprojekt Glasfaserausbau der ARGE Breitband und DNS:NET weiter. Nach Problemen wegen fehlender Tiefbaukapazität wird jetzt ausgebaut. (
The ongoing battle between copyright holders and pirates is often described as a cat and mouse game, especially when it comes to content protection.
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