An anonymous reader writes: An unknown vigilante hacker has been sabotaging the operations of the recently-revived Emotet botnet by replacing Emotet payloads with animated GIFs, effectively preventing victims from getting infected. The sabotage, which started on July 21, has grown from a simple joke to a serious issue impacting a large portion of the Emotet operation, reducing the biggest malware botnet…
Tag: blink
Venus, Long-Thought Dormant, Shows Signs of Volcanic Activity
Scientists have identified 37 volcanic structures on Venus that appear to be recently active — and probably still are today — painting the picture of a geologically dynamic planet and not a dormant world as long thought. NBC News reports: The research focused on ring-like structures called coronae, caused by an upwelling of hot rock from deep within the planet’s interior,…
A monster quasar in the early universe
Astronomers just announced the most massive quasar yet known in the early universe. Its monster central black hole has a mass equivalent to 1.5 billion of our suns. The object has been given a Hawaiian name, Poniua’ena. Source: https://earthsky.org/space/poniuaena-monster-quasar-in-early-universe…
Developer Warns VR Headset Damaged Eyesight
Software developer Danny Bittman tweeted about how he’s convinced that his eyesight was damaged from wearing a VR headset for hours a day. The BBC reports: Danny Bittman, who has worked as a virtual reality developer for four years, suggested it could have affected his eyesight. “Just had my first eye doctor visit in three years. Now I’m very worried about…
Touching the asteroid Ryugu
It’s a spectacular achievement to rendezvous with an asteroid as it’s whizzing around the sun. It’s even more amazing to collect a sample. That’s what the Hayabusa2 spacecraft did in February 2019. Here’s what researchers learned. Source: https://earthsky.org/space/asteroid-ryugu-hayabusa2-findings…
Life might survive, and thrive, in a hydrogen world: study
As new and more powerful telescopes blink on in the next few years, astronomers will be able to aim the megascopes at nearby exoplanets, peering into their atmospheres to decipher their composition and to seek signs of extraterrestrial life. But imagine if, in our search, we did encounter alien organisms but failed to recognize them as actual life. Source: https://phys.org/news/2020-05-life-survive-hydrogen-world.html…
This date in science: Clyde Tombaugh discovers Pluto
Ninety years ago on this date, Clyde Tombaugh discovered Pluto. It was, until 2006, regarded as the ninth planet in our solar system. Source: https://earthsky.org/space/this-date-in-science-clyde-tombaugh-discoverer-of-pluto…
Ultrafast quantum simulations: A new twist to an old approach
Billions of tiny interactions occur between thousands of particles in every piece of matter in the blink of an eye. Simulating these interactions in their full dynamics was said to be elusive but has now been made possible by new work of researchers from Oxford and Warwick. …
Tom DeLonge’s UFO Research Group Signs Contract With US Army To Develop Far-Future Tech
Blink-182 singer Tom DeLonge’s UFO research organization has signed an agreement with the U.S. Army in which it will help the military study and develop advanced materials for the purposes of develpoing “active camouflage, beamed energy propulsion, and quantum communication” for use on military vehicles. Motherboard reports: On October 17th, To the Stars joined forces with the Army’s Combat Capabilities Development…
Tiny stature of extinct ‘Hobbit’ thanks to fast evolution
New research suggests that the tiny human species – that survived until about 18,000 years ago, later than any human species other than our own – evolved its small size remarkably quickly while living on an isolated island. Source: https://earthsky.org/human-world/tiny-extinct-hobbit-human-species-fast-evolution…