Author: Kelly Fiveash

David Bowie—an icon whose music and swagger influenced the lives of so many people—has died at the age of 69 after an 18-month-long battle with cancer, his son Duncan Jones confirmed on Monday morning.

The news of Bowie's death comes just a few days after the megastar, known for hits that include Space Oddity, Heroes, and The Man Who Sold The World, released his latest album, Blackstar.

Bowie was not only a hugely influential musician to millions of fans during a career spanning 50 years, but he was also something of a pioneer in the online world, too.

Mozilla has warned Firefox users that its decision to reject SHA-1 certificates has caused an unfortunate side effect: some man-in-the-middle devices, such as security scanners and antivirus products, are failing to connect to HTTPS sites.

The browser maker advised any netizens affected by the interference to install the latest version of Firefox, which reinstates support for SHA-1.

Indeed, 'tis the season for browser upgrades. As Ars reported on Tuesday, Microsoft has been furiously nudging Internet Explorer holdouts over to the latest versions of its browser.

Microsoft has reminded Internet Explorer users that it will imminently end support for older versions of its browser from next week.

The software giant plans to hit the kill switch on IE 8, 9, and 10 on January 12, and it has been advising users to upgrade to Internet Explorer 11, or its new Edge browser, to avoid being exposed to potential security risks after that date.

From next Tuesday, Microsoft will end updates for the aged browsers and the nudge brigade from the Redmond camp is in full, sharp elbow mode to encourage users to swiftly upgrade to IE 11 or Edge. There will be one last patch on January 12 that will include an "End of Life" notification, asking users to upgrade.

Blighty’s slate grey skies may soon be peppered with DroneCops, after it was revealed by The Times that drones have been given the go ahead for “high-risk” criminal investigations by UK police.

More than a quarter of the 43 police forces in England and Wales are mulling whether to bring in drones to help them tackle burglaries and sieges, according to a report in the The Times—which was briefed on the plans.

However, the quadcopters could also be used by cops to, for example, allow them to eyeball protesters, in a move that is likely to raise concern among privacy campaigners.