Companies that sell refrigerators, washers, hairdryers, or TVs in the European Union will need to ensure those appliances can be repaired for up to 10 years, to help reduce the vast mountain of electrical waste that piles up each year on the continent. Euronews reports: The “right to repair,” as it is sometimes called, comes into force across the 27-nation bloc…
Tag: repair
Experian Challenged Over Massive Data Leak in Brazil
Experian may be in trouble again — this time in Brazil. ZDNet reports on “the emergence of a leak that exposed the personal data of more than 220 million citizens and companies, which is being offered for sale in the dark web.” After receiving feedback from Experian over a massive data leak in Brazil, São Paulo state consumer rights foundation Procon…
PlayStation 5 Controllers Are Suffering From Drift
Similar to Nintendo’s “Joy-Con drift,” Sony’s PlayStation 5 DualSense controller is apparently suffering from drift: movement on-screen that doesn’t correspond to any button press or input. ExtremeTech reports: Users have reported DualSense drift as quickly as 10 days after purchasing a PlayStation 5, which tracks with some of the shorter reports we’ve heard about Nintendo as well. We can assume that…
Silicon Valley needs to take responsibility for its political power
Big tech firms have enabled the US’s current mess – the time has come for them to acknowledge that they are key to our political process and repair the things they have broken, writes Annalee Newitz Source: https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg24933183-200-silicon-valley-needs-to-take-responsibility-for-its-political-power/?utm_campaign=RSS%7CNSNS&utm_source=NSNS&utm_medium=RSS&utm_content=home…
Windows 10 Bug Corrupts Your Hard Drive On Seeing This File’s Icon
An unpatched zero-day in Microsoft Windows 10 allows attackers to corrupt an NTFS-formatted hard drive with a one-line command. Bleeping Computer reports: In August 2020, October 2020, and finally this week, infosec researcher Jonas L drew attention to an NTFS vulnerability impacting Windows 10 that has not been fixed. When exploited, this vulnerability can be triggered by a single-line command to…
A robot made of ice could adapt and repair itself on other worlds
Some of the most tantalizing targets in space exploration are frozen ice worlds. Take Jupiter’s moon Europa, for instance. Its warm, salty subsurface ocean is buried under a moon-wide sheet of ice. What’s the best way to explore it? Source: https://phys.org/news/2021-01-robot-ice-worlds.html…
The Atlantic Urges Humankind to Fix the Social Web
Heading into the new year, the Atlantic’s executive editor penned a scathing warning that vast social networks like Facebook “can harm society just by existing…” Even as Facebook has insisted that it is a value-neutral vessel for the material its users choose to publish, moderation is a lever the company has tried to pull again and again. But there aren’t enough…
Can mRNA Biotechnology be Adapted to Improve Flu Vaccines and Fight Cancer?
Reuters notes the “miraculous speed” of mRNA vaccines, while also calling it “a glimpse of what’s possible if it can be applied post-pandemic to treat cancer or rare diseases.” The vaccine market alone is worth about $35 billion each year, and investors apparently believe mRNA companies will capture around two-third of that, leading market researcher Bernstein to evalaute the combined worth…
Apple Launches Repair Program For Unresponding IPhone 11 Displays
9to5Mac reports that Apple announced a repair program for “a small percentage” of iPhone 11s manufactured between November 2019 and May 2020 where the display stops responding to touch:
The replacement program is exclusive to the regular iPhone 11 model and does not apply to the iPhone 11 Pro or iPhone 11 Pro Max. Users can check the Apple Support website to…
Tips on choosing telescopes and binoculars for beginners
Tips for beginners: how to choose binoculars or your first telescope. Source: https://earthsky.org/astronomy-essentials/how-to-choose-1st-telescope-binoculars…