September 2022 – news.buyenne.com

COVID may have pushed a leading seasonal flu strain to extinction

No one has confirmed a case of influenza B/Yamagata since April 2020.

A bottle of influenza vaccine at a CVS pharmacy and MinuteClinic on September 10, 2021, in Miami.

The pandemic coronavirus' debut wrought universal havoc—not even seasonal flu viruses were spared. Amid travel restrictions, quarantines, closures, physical distancing, masking, enhanced hand washing, and disinfection, the 2020-2021 flu season was all but canceled. That meant not just an unprecedented global decrease in the number of people sick with the flu but also a dramatic collapse in the genetic diversity of circulating flu strains. Many subtypes of the virus all but vanished. But most notably, one entire lineage—one of only four flu groups targeted by seasonal influenza vaccines—went completely dark, seemingly extinct.

Researchers noted the absence last year as the flu was still struggling to recover from its pandemic knockout. But now, the flu has come roaring back and threatens to cause a particularly nasty season in the Northern Hemisphere. Still, the influenza B/Yamagata lineage remains missing, according to a study published this week in the journal Eurosurveillance. It has not been definitively detected since April 2020. And the question of whether it's truly gone extinct lingers.

What B/Yamagata's absence might mean for future flu seasons and flu shots also remains an open question. For a quick refresher: Four main types of seasonal flu have been circulating globally among humans in recent years. Two are influenza type A viruses: subtypes of H1N1 viruses and H3N2 viruses. The other two are influenza type B viruses: offshoots of the Victoria and Yamagata lineages. (For a more detailed explanation of influenza, check out our explainer here.) Current quadrivalent vaccines target season-specific versions of each of these four types of flu viruses.

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Florida’s Space Coast on track after Ian, set for 3 launches in 3 days

Managers will assess the scope of work to perform while in the VAB.

United Launch Alliance moves its Atlas V booster into the Vertical Integration Facility adjacent to Space Launch Complex-41 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station on Monday, August 26.

Hurricane Ian cut a devastating swath across Florida this week, and its core passed directly over Kennedy Space Center and Cape Canaveral on Thursday.

However, by then, Ian had weakened to become a moderately strong tropical storm, with the bulk of its heaviest rainfall to the north of the launchpads along the Atlantic coast. As a result, damage to NASA's launch facilities at Kennedy Space Center, and the Space Force launchpads at Cape Canaveral, was minimal.

Accordingly, by Friday, work was already underway at facilities along Florida's "Space Coast" for a rapid-fire succession of three launches in three days.

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"Im Winter ist mit einer bedeutenden russischen Offensive zu rechnen"

Kiew hat hohe Verluste zu verzeichnen. Deutsche Waffenhilfe allein ist an der Front nicht entscheidend. Ein Gespräch mit dem Militärexperten Wassili Kaschin üner den Verlauf des Ukraine-Krieges aus russischer Sicht.

Nintendoes what Valve don’t: Game barred from Steam will launch on Switch

Visual novel insider says “school setting” may have caused concern for Valve.

Japanese publisher Spike Chunsoft announced that the first official English translation of visual novel Chaos;Head Noah won't be coming to Steam as planned "due to Steam's guideline-required changes to the game's content." But while the game is apparently too risqué for Steam, the family-friendly folks at Nintendo apparently have no problem with a Switch version that Spike Chunsoft says will still launch in the US on October 7 as scheduled.

"Spike Chunsoft, Inc. believes these [Steam guideline-required] changes would not allow the game to be released to its standards," the publisher said in its announcement. "The company is looking into delivering the title through alternative storefronts, and when details are decided will make another formal announcement. Until then your patience and understanding is appreciated."

Nintendo says this scene is appropriate for its store page, so we figure you readers can handle it. (credit: Nintendo)

Chaos;Head Noah was initially listed for Steam pre-sale in April, but that page was taken down in August, according to tracking site SteamDB. At the time, that led to some concerns about the eventual fate of the Steam version, which Spike Chunsoft finally confirmed today.

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YouTube age-restriction quagmire exposed by 78-minute Mega Man documentary

“Summoning Salt” left with little understanding on where auto-moderation line is drawn.

Enlarge (credit: Aurich Lawson / Capcom)

A YouTube creator has gone on the offensive after facing an increasingly common problem on the platform: moderation and enforcement that leaves creators confused by the logic and short on their videos' revenue potential.

The trouble centers on a longtime YouTube video host whose content is popular among the retro-gaming devotees at Ars Technica's staff. The creator, who goes by the online handle "Summoning Salt," chronicles the history of various classic games' speedrunning world records. His hour-plus analyses demonstrate how different players approach older games and exploit various bugs. The games in question are typically cartoony 2D fare instead of violent or M-rated titles.

Summoning Salt asks why his YouTube video was age-restricted.

On Friday, Summoning Salt took to social media to claim that his latest 78-minute documentary about 1989's Mega Man 2, which went live in mid-September, has been "age-restricted" by YouTube's moderation system. Bizarrely, the video had been age-restricted roughly one week ago, only for YouTube to relent to the creator's appeal and claim that the restriction had been placed in error.

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Lilbits: Fire Toolbox v29, Android 14, and farewell to USB “SuperSpeed” branding

Android 13 is still pretty new, but Google is already working on the next major version of Android and Esper’s Mishaal Rahman has rounded up a surprising number of details about Android 14 considering how far away it is from release. Meanwhile t…

The post Lilbits: Fire Toolbox v29, Android 14, and farewell to USB “SuperSpeed” branding appeared first on Liliputing.

Stadia controllers could become e-waste unless Google issues Bluetooth update

One firmware push could let Stadia fans keep their favorite wireless controller.

Ars originally liked the Stadia controller, describing it as "solidly built, with springy, responsive inputs." It could still be that way without a giant USB cord if Google unlocked its full Bluetooth capabilities.

Google's Stadia game-streaming service will die a nearly inevitable death early next year. Google is refunding players the cost of all their hardware and game purchases. But, so far, Google is also leaving Stadia players with controllers that, while once costing $70, will soon do less than a $20 Bluetooth gamepad.

Stadia's controllers were custom-made to connect directly to the Internet, reducing lag and allowing for instant firmware updates and (sometimes painful) connections to smart TVs. There's Bluetooth inside the Stadia controller, but it's only used when you're setting up Stadia, either with a TV, a computer with the Chrome browser, or a Chromecast Ultra.

The Google Store's page for the Stadia controller states in a footnote: "Product contains Bluetooth Classic radio. No Bluetooth Classic functionality is enabled at this time. Bluetooth Classic may be implemented at a later date." (Bluetooth Classic is a more traditional version of Bluetooth than modern low-energy or mesh versions.)

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Court Denies MindGeek’s Request for a Sweeping Anti-Piracy Injunction

Adult entertainment conglomerate MindGeek owns many tube sites including Pornhub. While the company itself has a piracy history, today it’s one of the most protective copyright holders in the industry. With a sweeping court injunction, it hoped to take Daftsex.com and several related services offline. However, the court slammed the brakes on the request, at least for now.

From: TF, for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

denied request Mindgeek is without doubt one of the largest and most powerful adult entertainment conglomerates in existence today.

The company effectively transformed the porn industry in less than a decade, luring people in with a promise of ‘free’ content. Mindgeek owns Pornhub, one of the most visited websites on the Internet, and is also the driving force behind YouPorn, RedTube, Tube8, Xtube, and dozens of other sites.

Several of these tube sites became big by offering access to a wide variety of content, including pirated videos that were posted by their users without permission. That doesn’t mean that MindGeek is turning a blind eye to pirates. On the contrary.

MindGeek’s current empire includes companies that create video content and own the rights. MG Premium, for example, has many thousands of copyrighted adult videos in its repertoire under popular brands such as Brazzers, Digital Playground, MOFOS, and Reality Kings. These videos are often pirated and shared through external sites, presenting a problem for the company.

MindGeek Sues Daftsex and Artporn

To address this issue, MindGeek’s daughter company regularly goes to court. In a recent case, filed at the federal court in the District of Washington, Vasily Kharchenko, the alleged operator of Daftsex.com and Artporn.com, stands accused of mass copyright infringement.

These sites have been a thorn in MindGeek’s side for years but targeting their domains with hundreds of thousands of DMCA takedown notices didn’t produce the desired result. So, in 2020, MindGeek obtained a DMCA subpoena against Cloudflare to unmask their operator. This quest eventually led to Kharchenko.

MG Premium alleges that the operator personally uploaded 2,143 of its copyrighted works to the sites. Through the court, the company hopes to stop these infringements. In addition, the company demands compensation for the damages suffered.

Thus far, the lawsuit has been a one-sided battle, as Kharchenko didn’t respond to the allegations at all. This prompted MG Premium to request a default judgment, asking for $15,000 in damages per infringement, for a total of $32,145,000.

Injuction Targets Verisign, Cloudflare, Namecheap and others

In addition, MG Premium also moved for a broad injunction that would require various third-party online services to cut their ties with the infringing sites and their alleged operator. The adult company believes that would help to shut down the piracy operation.

In addition to DaftSex and Artporn, the proposed injunction also includes Biqle.com and Daxab.com. The latter is a CDN for streaming videos, which is used by DaftSex and others. All these sites are allegedly run by Kharchenko.

Verisign, the registry responsible for .com, .net, .cc, and .tv domain names, is one of the third-party services mentioned in the proposed injunction. MindGeek wants Verisign to disable the Daftsex.com, Artsporn.com, Daxab.com, and Biqle.com domains and transfer them to the porn conglomerate.

In addition, other domain name companies, hosting, and CDN providers should be compelled to cut their ties with the sites in question. Those companies include Cloudflare, FDC Servers, Namecheap.com, NameSilo and PrivacyGuardian.org.

MG Premium’s Proposed Order

An order of this magnitude would be very effective indeed, but the court had its reservations. Despite the fact that the accused failed to appear in court, United States District Judge Benjamin Settle denied the injunction.

Injuction Denied, For Now

According to the Judge, MG Premium should provide more details about the contacts between the defendant and the third-party services, in order to justify such a “sweeping” order.

“The Court is not prepared to issue a sweeping injunction against numerous nonparties based only on the conclusory, unsupported allegation that Vasily Kharchenko is in privity with them, or on the implausible claim that Kharchenko controls these entities,” Judge Settle writes.

This means that MG Premium must go back to the drawing board and submit a new motion for a default judgment, supported by additional evidence and analysis.

If the company eventually gets its way this could spell trouble for other pirate sites as well. In any case, it will be interesting to see how the case develops and what the potential aftermath might be.

From: TF, for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

Court Denies MindGeek’s Request for a Sweeping Anti-Piracy Injunction

From: TF, for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

denied request Mindgeek is without doubt one of the largest and most powerful adult entertainment conglomerates in existence today.

MindGeek Sues Daftsex and Artporn

Injuction Targets Verisign, Cloudflare, Namecheap and others

MG Premium’s Proposed Order

Injuction Denied, For Now

According to the Judge, MG Premium should provide more details about the contacts between the defendant and the third-party services, in order to justify such a “sweeping” order.

This means that MG Premium must go back to the drawing board and submit a new motion for a default judgment, supported by additional evidence and analysis.

From: TF, for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

High-severity Microsoft Exchange 0-day under attack threatens 220,000 servers

Microsoft said it’s working on an accelerated schedule to roll out a patch.

The word ZERO-DAY is hidden amidst a screen filled with ones and zeroes.

Microsoft late Thursday confirmed the existence of two critical vulnerabilities in its Exchange application that have already compromised multiple servers and pose a serious risk to an estimated 220,000 more around the world.

The currently unpatched security flaws have been under active exploit since early August, when Vietnam-based security firm GTSC discovered customer networks had been infected with malicious webshells and that the initial entry point was some sort of Exchange vulnerability. The mystery exploit looked almost identical to an Exchange zero-day from 2021 called ProxyShell, but the customers’ servers had all been patched against the vulnerability, which is tracked as CVE-2021-34473. Eventually, the researchers discovered the unknown hackers were exploiting a new Exchange vulnerability.

Webshells, backdoors, and fake sites

“After successfully mastering the exploit, we recorded attacks to collect information and create a foothold in the victim's system,” the researchers wrote in a post published on Wednesday. “The attack team also used various techniques to create backdoors on the affected system and perform lateral movements to other servers in the system.”

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