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Manchester Attack Could Lead To Internet Crackdown

New submitter boundary writes: The UK government looks to be about to put the most egregious parts of the Investigative Powers Act into force “soon after the election” (which is in a couple of weeks) in the wake of the recent bombing in Manchester. “Technical Capability Orders” require tech companies to break their own security. […]

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Vermont DMV Caught Using Illegal Facial Recognition Program

schwit1 quotes a report from Vocativ: The Vermont Department of Motor Vehicles has been caught using facial recognition software — despite a state law preventing it. Documents obtained by the American Civil Liberties Union of Vermont describe such a program, which uses software to compare the DMV’s database of names and driver’s license photos with […]

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Technology

Facebook Signs BuzzFeed, Vox, Others For Original Video Shows

Facebook has signed deals with Vox Media, BuzzFeed, ATTN, Group Nine Media and others to make shows for its upcoming video service, which will feature long and short-form content with ad breaks. The social media company is reportedly set to pay up to $250,000 for the longer, scripted shows. Reuters reports: Facebook is planning two […]

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Technology

Study Finds Magic Mushrooms Are the Safest Recreational Drug

An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Guardian: Mushrooms are the safest of all the drugs people take recreationally, according to this year’s Global Drug Survey. Of the more than 12,000 people who reported taking psilocybin hallucinogenic mushrooms in 2016, just 0.2% of them said they needed emergency medical treatment — a rate at […]

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Robot Police Officer Goes On Duty In Dubai

The first robot officer has joined the Dubai Police force tasked with patrolling the city’s malls and tourist attractions. “People will be able to use it to report crimes, pay fines and get information by tapping a touchscreen on its chest,” reports BBC. “Data collected by the robot will also be shared with the transport […]

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Windows Switch To Git Almost Complete: 8,500 Commits and 1,760 Builds Each Day

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: Back in February, Microsoft made the surprising announcement that the Windows development team was going to move to using the open source Git version control system for Windows development. A little over three months after that first revelation, and about 90 percent of the Windows engineering […]

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Technology

Consumers Trust Robots For Surgery Over Savings, Research Finds

An anonymous reader shares an article: Andy Maguire faces a challenge: tasked with upgrading HSBC’s digital-banking systems, he has discovered that customers are twice as likely to trust a robot for heart surgery than for picking a savings account. “I do find it slightly odd,” said the chief operating officer of Europe’s largest bank, referring […]

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Airbnb Is Running Its Own Internal University To Teach Data Science

In an effort to fill the demand for trained data scientists, Airbnb will be running its own university-style program, complete with a custom course-numbering system. Since traditional online programs like Coursera and Udacity weren’t getting the job done because they weren’t tailored to Airbnb’s internal data and tools, the company “decided to design a bunch […]

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Intel Drops Thunderbolt 3 Royalty, Adds CPU Integration and Works Closely With Microsoft

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Windows Central: Over the last few days, Thunderbolt 3 has been a hot topic amongst Windows users especially with its notable absence with the new Surface Pro and Surface Laptop. Part of the problem is adoption, integration, cost, and consumer confusion according to Microsoft. Intel is aware of […]

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Fitness Trackers Out of Step When Measuring Calories, Research Shows

Fitness devices can help monitor heart rate but are unreliable at keeping tabs on calories burned, research has revealed. From a report on The Guardian: Scientists put seven consumer devices through their paces, comparing their data with gold-standard laboratory measurements. “We were pleasantly surprised at how well the heart rate did — under many circumstances […]

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