Month: September 2024

Enlarge / Researchers say that Dungeons & Dragons can give autistic players a way to engage in low-risk social interactions. (credit: Nicole Hill/CC BY-SA 4.0)

Since its introduction in the 1970s, Dungeons & Dragons has become one of the most influential tabletop role-playing games (TRPGs) in popular culture, featuring heavily in Stranger Things, for example, and spawning a blockbuster movie released last year. Over the last decade or so, researchers have turned their focus more heavily to the ways in which D&D and other TRPGs can help people with autism form healthy social connections, in part because the gaming environment offers clear rules around social interactions. According to the authors of a new paper published in the journal Autism, D&D helped boost players' confidence with autism, giving them a strong sense of kinship or belonging, among other benefits.

“There are many myths and misconceptions about autism, with some of the biggest suggesting that those with it aren’t socially motivated, or don’t have any imagination," said co-author Gray Atherton, a psychologist at the University of Plymouth. "Dungeons & Dragons goes against all that, centering around working together in a team, all of which takes place in a completely imaginary environment. Those taking part in our study saw the game as a breath of fresh air, a chance to take on a different persona and share experiences outside of an often challenging reality. That sense of escapism made them feel incredibly comfortable, and many of them said they were now trying to apply aspects of it in their daily lives.”

Prior research has shown that autistic people are more likely to feel lonely, have smaller social networks, and often experience anxiety in social settings. Their desire for social connection leads many to "mask" their neurodivergent traits in public for fear of being rejected as a result of social gaffes. "I think every autistic person has had multiple instances of social rejection and loss of relationships," one of the study participants said when Atherton et al. interviewed them about their experiences. "You've done something wrong. You don't know what it is. They don't tell you, and you find out when you've been just, you know, left shunned in relationships, left out.... It's traumatic."

Enlarge (credit: Getty Images)

Federal prosecutors on Thursday unsealed an indictment charging six Russian nationals with conspiracy to hack into the computer networks of the Ukrainian government and its allies and steal or destroy sensitive data on behalf of the Kremlin.

The indictment, filed in US District Court for the District of Maryland, said that five of the men were officers in Unit 29155 of the Russian Main Intelligence Directorate (GRU), a military intelligence agency of the General Staff of the Armed Forces. Along with a sixth defendant, prosecutors alleged, they engaged in a conspiracy to hack, exfiltrate data, leak information, and destroy computer systems associated with the Ukrainian government in advance of the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.

Targeting critical infrastructure with WhisperGate

The indictment, which supersedes one filed earlier, comes 32 months after Microsoft documented its discovery of a destructive piece of malware, dubbed WhisperGate, had infected dozens of Ukrainian government, nonprofit, and IT organizations. WhisperGate masqueraded as ransomware, but in actuality was malware that permanently destroyed computers and the data stored on them by wiping the master boot record—a part of the hard drive needed to start the operating system during bootup.

Enlarge / The eruptions that produced the dark mare on the lunar surface ended billions of years ago. (credit: NASA/GSFC/Arizona State University)

Signs of volcanic activity on the Moon can be viewed simply by looking up at the night-time sky: The large, dark plains called "maria" are the product of massive outbursts of volcanic material. But these were put in place relatively early in the Moon's history, with their formation ending roughly 3 billion years ago. Smaller-scale additions may have continued until roughly 2 billion years ago. Evidence of that activity includes samples obtained by China's Chang'e-5 lander.

But there are hints that small-scale volcanism continued until much more recent times. Observations from space have identified terrain that seems to be the product of eruptions, but only has a limited number of craters, suggesting a relatively young age. But there's considerable uncertainty about these deposits.

Now, further data from samples returned to Earth by the Chang’e-5 mission show clear evidence of volcanism that is truly recent in the context of the history of the Solar System. Small beads that formed during an eruption have been dated to just 125 million years ago.

Enlarge / The eruptions that produced the dark mare on the lunar surface ended billions of years ago. (credit: NASA/GSFC/Arizona State University)

Signs of volcanic activity on the Moon can be viewed simply by looking up at the night-time sky: The large, dark plains called "maria" are the product of massive outbursts of volcanic material. But these were put in place relatively early in the Moon's history, with their formation ending roughly 3 billion years ago. Smaller-scale additions may have continued until roughly 2 billion years ago. Evidence of that activity includes samples obtained by China's Chang'e-5 lander.

But there are hints that small-scale volcanism continued until much more recent times. Observations from space have identified terrain that seems to be the product of eruptions, but only has a limited number of craters, suggesting a relatively young age. But there's considerable uncertainty about these deposits.

Now, further data from samples returned to Earth by the Chang’e-5 mission show clear evidence of volcanism that is truly recent in the context of the history of the Solar System. Small beads that formed during an eruption have been dated to just 125 million years ago.

Enlarge / Herpes simplex virus, (HSV). Image taken with transmission electron microscopy. (credit: Getty | BSIP)

As the US Surgeon General recently highlighted, parenting is stressful. From navigating social media to facing a youth mental health crisis, challenges abound. But, for one father in Spain, even the simple, loving, everyday act of giving your child a peck on the cheek has turned to nightmare fuel.

According to a case report in the New England Journal of Medicine, the man's 9-year-old daughter developed a fever along with a crusty, blistering lesion on her left cheek. Doctors initially diagnosed the blotch as impetigo, a bacterial infection on the skin's surface layers that is fairly common in children. It's often caused by Staphylococcus aureus or Streptococcus bacteria and is generally easily treated with antibiotics.

Enlarge / Herpes simplex virus, (HSV). Image taken with transmission electron microscopy. (credit: Getty | BSIP)

As the US Surgeon General recently highlighted, parenting is stressful. From navigating social media to facing a youth mental health crisis, challenges abound. But, for one father in Spain, even the simple, loving, everyday act of giving your child a peck on the cheek has turned to nightmare fuel.

According to a case report in the New England Journal of Medicine, the man's 9-year-old daughter developed a fever along with a crusty, blistering lesion on her left cheek. Doctors initially diagnosed the blotch as impetigo, a bacterial infection on the skin's surface layers that is fairly common in children. It's often caused by Staphylococcus aureus or Streptococcus bacteria and is generally easily treated with antibiotics.

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AT&T filed a lawsuit against Broadcom on August 29 accusing it of seeking to “retroactively change existing VMware contracts to match its new corporate strategy.” The lawsuit, spotted by Channel Futures, concerns claims that Broadcom is not letting AT&T renew support services for previously purchased perpetual VMware software licenses unless AT&T meets certain conditions.

Broadcom closed its $61 billion VMware acquisition in November and swiftly enacted sweeping changes. For example, in December, Broadcom announced the end of VMware perpetual license sales in favor of subscriptions of bundled products. Combined with higher core requirements per CPU subscription, complaints ensued that VMware was getting more expensive to work with.

AT&T uses VMware software to run 75,000 virtual machines (VMs) across about 8,600 servers, per the complaint filed at the Supreme Court of the State of New York [PDF]. It reportedly uses the VMs to support customer service operations and for operations management efficiency.

Enlarge / A Verizon FiOS truck in Manhattan on September 15, 2017. (credit: Getty Images | Smith Collection | Gado)

Verizon today announced a deal to acquire Frontier Communications, an Internet service provider with about 3 million customers in 25 states. Verizon said the all-cash transaction is valued at $20 billion.

Verizon agreed to pay $9.6 billion and is taking on over $10 billion in debt held by Frontier. Verizon said the deal is subject to regulatory approval and a vote by Frontier shareholders and is expected to be completed in 18 months.

"Under the terms of the agreement, Verizon will acquire Frontier for $38.50 per share in cash, representing a premium of 43.7 percent to Frontier's 90-Day volume-weighted average share price (VWAP) on September 3, 2024, the last trading day prior to media reports regarding a potential acquisition of Frontier," Verizon said.