The modern world is powered by electrical circuitry on a “chip”—the semiconductor chip underpinning computers, cell phones, the internet, and other applications. In the year 2025, humans are expected to be creating 175 zettabytes (175 trillion gigabytes) of new data. How can we ensure the security of sensitive data at such a high volume? And how can we address grand-challenge-like problems,…
Tag: cell phones
China Accused of Spying On Americans Via Caribbean Phone Networks
“A mobile security expert has accused China of exploiting cellphone networks in the Caribbean to conduct ‘mass surveillance’ on Americans,” reports Newsweek: Gary Miller, a former vice president of network security at California-based analytics company Mobileum, told The Guardian he had amassed evidence of espionage conducted via “decades-old vulnerabilities” in the global telecommunications system. While not explicitly mentioned in the report,…
Pinning down the ampere with a supersensitive particle detector
From light bulbs to cell phones, all electronic devices in everyday life rely on the flow of electrons to function. Just as scientists use meters to describe the length of an object or seconds to measure the passage of time, they use amperes, or amps, to quantify electric current—the rate at which electric charge moves through a circuit. …
Semiconductor manufacturing techniques employed for new gamma-ray detector
NASA astrophysicists and engineers are adapting detectors used by earthbound supercolliders and creating them the same way electronics companies produce all modern consumer devices, including cell phones and laptops. Source: https://phys.org/news/2020-08-semiconductor-techniques-gamma-ray-detector.html…
LinkedIn Cuts 960 Jobs as Pandemic Puts the Brakes on Corporate Hiring
Microsoft’s professional networking site LinkedIn said on Tuesday it would cut about 960 jobs, or 6% of its global workforce, as the coronavirus pandemic is having a sustained impact on demand for its recruitment products. From a report: California-based LinkedIn helps employers assess a candidate’s suitability for a role and employees use the platform to find new job. Jobs will be…
The Math of Social Distancing Is a Lesson in Geometry
Sphere packing might seem like a topic only a mathematician could love. Who else could get excited about finding the most efficient way to arrange circles in the plane, or spheres in space? But right now, millions of people all over the world are thinking about this very problem. From a report: Determining how to safely reopen buildings and public spaces…
Facebook Wanted NSO Spyware To Monitor Users, NSO CEO Claims
Facebook representatives approached controversial surveillance vendor NSO Group to try and buy a tool that could help Facebook better monitor a subset of its users, according to an extraordinary court filing from NSO in an ongoing lawsuit. From a report: Facebook is currently suing NSO for how the hacking firm leveraged a vulnerability in WhatsApp to help governments hack users. NSO…
Two Men Used Drones to Smuggle Drugs, Cell Phones Into Prison
“The United States Department of Justice has charged two New Jersey men with using drones to sneak drugs and other contraband into a federal prison…” reports CNN: The two men, Nicolo Denichilo, 38, and Adrian Goolcharran, 35, smuggled items including marijuana, steroids, cell phones, SIM cards, and syringes into the prison in Fort Dix, New Jersey, according to the US Attorney’s…
‘I Asked My Students To Turn In Their Cellphones and Write About Living Without Them’
Rog Srigley, writer who teaches at Humber College and Laurentian University, offered his students extra credit if they would give him their phones for nine days and write about living without them. “What they wrote was remarkable, and remarkably consistent,” he writes. “These university students, given the chance to say what they felt, didn’t gracefully submit to the tech industry and…
College Students Say Ditching Their Smartphones For a Week Changed Their Lives
“They survived!” reports a local CBS news station, revisiting nearly two dozen students at Adelphi University who went a full week without their cell phones. schwit1 shares their report:
It was part of a college course intended to break the powerful addiction of smartphones… an Adelphi University course called “Life Unplugged” where students did the unthinkable one week ago — handed over…