According to the Wall Street Journal, Intel may receive billions in U.S. government funding to build secret facilities that produce microchips for the military. SiliconANGLE reports: The facilities, which have not yet been disclosed, would be designated as a "secure enclave" to reduce the military's dependence on chips imported from East Asia, particularly Taiwan, which is at risk of a future invasion from China. The funding for the new facilities would come from the $52.7 billion allocated under the Chips Act, signed into law by President Biden in August 2022. The Chips Act, which had bipartisan support, promotes chipmaking and scientific research through funding and tax credits. The law is aimed at encouraging domestic manufacturing of semiconductors and helping U.S. companies compete with China in developing cutting-edge technologies.

The new Intel facilities, presuming they go ahead, could reside partly at Intel's Arizona factory complex, according to sources referenced in the Journal report. The exact amount of funding that will be made available is not yet known, but "people familiar with the situation" tell the Journal that they could cost about $3 billion to $4 billion, which would come from the $39 billion set aside in the Chips Act for manufacturing grants. Officials from the Commerce Department, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and the Defense Department are said to be negotiating the project with Intel but have not yet made a final decision.

The first manufacturing grants under the Chip Act are expected to be announced in the coming weeks. The program was reported to have had more than 500 entities express interest and more than 130 have submitted applications or pre-applications for funding.

Tech groups have called on ministers to clarify the extent of proposed powers that they fear would allow the UK government to intervene and block the rollout of new privacy features for messaging apps. FT: The Investigatory Powers Amendment Bill, which was set out in the King's Speech on Tuesday, would oblige companies to inform the Home Office in advance about any security or privacy features they want to add to their platforms, including encryption. At present, the government has the power to force telecoms companies and messaging platforms to supply data on national security grounds and to help with criminal investigations.

The new legislation was designed to "recalibrate" those powers to respond to risks posed to public safety by multinational tech companies rolling out new services that "preclude lawful access to data," the government said. But Meredith Whittaker, president of private messaging group Signal, urged ministers to provide more clarity on what she described as a "bellicose" proposal amid fears that, if enacted, the new legislation would allow ministers and officials to veto the introduction of new safety features. "We will need to see the details, but what is being described suggests an astonishing level of technically confused government over-reach that will make it nearly impossible for any service, homegrown or foreign, to operate with integrity in the UK," she told the Financial Times.

Baidu ordered AI chips from Huawei this year, Reuters reported citing two people familiar with the matter, adding to signs that U.S. pressure is prompting Chinese acceptance of the firm's products as an alternative to Nvidia's. From the report: One of the people said Baidu, one of China's leading AI firms, which operates the Ernie large language model, placed the order in August, ahead of widely anticipated new rules by the U.S. government that in October tightened restrictions on exports of chips and chip tools to China, including those of U.S. chip giant Nvidia.

Baidu ordered 1,600 of Huawei's 910B Ascend AI chips - which the Chinese firm developed as an alternative to Nvidia's A100 chip - for 200 servers, the source said, adding that by October, Huawei had delivered more 60% of the order, or about 1,000 chips, to Baidu. The second person said that the order's total value was approximately 450 million yuan ($61.83 million) and that Huawei was to deliver all of the chips by the end of this year. Although the order is tiny relative to the thousands of chips top Chinese tech firms have historically ordered from Nvidia, the sources said it was significant, as it showed how some firms could shift away from the U.S. company.

An anonymous reader writes: The U.S. government has indicted alleged members of a criminal group that uses insiders at Walmart and other techniques to commit 'refund fraud' on a massive scale, according to recently unsealed court records. In short, the scam involves someone ordering an item from, say, Amazon -- which in this case says it lost $700,000 -- receiving the item, and then using one of various tricks to get their money back from the retailer. The person is then free to sell the item online, and the criminal group takes a fee.

The indictment as well as 404 Media's own research into refund fraud reveals a professionalized ecosystem of sellers and people providing various services as part of the wide-reaching scam. As well as malicious insiders, refund scammers take advantage of customer service representatives and online retailers' lax refund policies to get expensive items for free. This is not a crime whose only victims are giant retailers, who may garner little sympathy. Delivery drivers, who already have very difficult jobs, are often dinged for misdelivering or failing to deliver a package, which is something these types of scams often rely on.

The state of Maine is "poised to vote on an unprecedented plan to rid themselves of the state's two largest electric utilities and start with a clean slate," reports the Associated Press: The proposed takeover of two investor-owned utilities that distribute 97% of electricity in the state would mark the first time a U.S. state's utilities were forcibly removed at the same time. The referendum calls for dismantling Central Maine Power and Versant Power and replacing them with a nonprofit utility called Pine Tree Power to operate 28,000 miles (45,000 kilometers) of transmission lines...

The referendum calls for creation of a nonprofit utility with a board made up of mostly elected members and a few appointed ones. A primary selling point is that the new utility would be beholden only to ratepayers, not corporate shareholders, allowing lower costs, greater investments in the grid and improved performance, supporters said. Interest rates for long-term borrowing for capital improvements also would be less costly for Pine Tree Power. Supporters say there's little to lose: Both investor-owned utilities rank near the bottom in customer satisfaction, with longer-than-average response to power outages and higher-than-average electricity rates.

But critics, including Democratic Gov. Janet Mills, worry about the power grid becoming politicized. They also question savings projections because of the billions of dollars needed to buy out the utilities, and worry about the prospect of lengthy litigation. Maine Public Advocate William Harwood contends legal disputes could postpone the new utility's implementation by five to 10 years.
The American Public Power Association estimates that investor-owned utilities serve 66% of America's electricity consumers, according to the article. So the Associated Press notes that "Across the country, ratepayers who are unhappy with their utilities are watching what happens," citing this quote from energy-related research firm Clear View Energy Partners.

"What we say about state policy and trends is that it could become contagious."

Thanks to Slashdot reader jenningsthecat for sharing the article.

Friday the U.K.'s competition regulator made an announcement. Amazon and Meta agreed they wouldn't use data collected their marketplaces for an unfair advantage against competitors.

The Register explains: In Amazon's case, the e-commerce giant used vendors' sales figures to decide which items it should sell, and how much to price products to get an edge over everyone else. The internet behemoth also promoted its own products with its Buy Box feature and it further cut into retailers' margins by charging extra costs if they wanted to use Amazon's Prime delivery services, the CMA said. Now Amazon has committed to doing less of that.

The Competition and Markets Authority said [Amazon] will be prevented from using third-party seller data that gives it an unfair commercial advantage, and will allow rivals to negotiate rates with independent delivery contractors working on behalf of Amazon. Merchants' items will also be better supported by the Buy Box too, according to the CMA, instead of Amazon-led products or those from sellers that have bought into the company's packing and delivery services...

[Facebook] was accused of exploiting advertisers hawking wares on Facebook Marketplace, and using competitors' data to improve its own products or services. "Going forward, competitors of Facebook Marketplace that advertise on Meta platforms can 'opt out' of their data being used to improve Facebook Marketplace," the CMA said.
The CMA also has specific plans for enforcement, reports TechCrunch. for Meta the UK agency "has said it will set up a monitoring trustee to oversee its adherence, including its new technical system rollout and employee training," while Amazon will also get an "independent trustee" overseeing their compliance.

"Home schooling has become — by a wide margin — America's fastest-growing form of education," according to a new analysis by the Washington Post. (Alternate URL here): The analysis — based on data The Post collected for thousands of school districts across the country — reveals that a dramatic rise in home schooling at the onset of the pandemic has largely sustained itself through the 2022-23 academic year, defying predictions that most families would return to schools that have dispensed with mask mandates and other covid-19 restrictions...

In states with comparable enrollment figures, the number of home-schooled students increased 51% over the past six school years, far outpacing the 7% growth in private school enrollment. Public school enrollment dropped 4% in those states over the same period, a decline partly attributable to home schooling...

In 390 districts included in The Post's analysis, there was at least one home-schooled child for every 10 in public schools during the 2021-2022 academic year, the most recent for which district-level federal enrollment data are available. That's roughly quadruple the number of districts that had rates that high in 2017-2018, signifying a sea change in how many communities educate their children and an urgent challenge for a public education system that faced dwindling enrollment even before the pandemic... The National Center for Education Statistics reported that in 2019 — before home schooling's dramatic expansion — there were 1.5 million kids being home-schooled in the United States, the last official federal estimate. Based on that figure and the growth since then in states that track home schooling, The Post estimates that there are now between 1.9 million and 2.7 million home-schooled children in the United States, depending on the rate of increase in areas without reliable data...

It is a remarkable expansion for a form of instruction that 40 years ago was still considered illegal in much of the country.
Other interesting facts from their analysis:

• "Home schooling's surging popularity crosses every measurable line of politics, geography and demographics."

• "Despite claims that the home-schooling boom is a result of failing public schools, The Post found no correlation between school district quality, as measured by standardized test scores, and home-schooling growth. In fact, high-scoring districts had some of the biggest spikes in home schooling early in the pandemic, though by the fall of 2022 increases were similar regardless of school performance."

• "Many of America's new home-schooled children have entered a world where no government official will ever check on what, or how well, they are being taught."

Many Americans want to abolish Daylight Saving Time, reports NBC News: Since 2018, nearly all states have passed or entertained legislation that would drop the twice-a-year time shift. And 19 states have passed laws or resolutions in support of year-round daylight saving time, according to data from the National Conference of State Legislatures. But there's a caveat: Nothing can change until Congress addresses a 1960s-era law blocking such action.
"This ritual of changing time twice a year is stupid," U.S. Senator Marco Rubio said in March, reintroducing legislation to end Daylight Saving Time. In an official statement the Senator announced that "Locking the clock has overwhelming bipartisan and popular support. This Congress, I hope that we can finally get this done."

But according to the Hill, "Both the House and Senate versions of the Sunshine Protection Act of 2023 haven't appeared to go far. The Senate bill has been read twice and referred to a committee, while the House bill has only been referred to a subcommittee."

While America waits, another medical association has come out in favor of ending Daylight Saving Time, reports NBC News: The American Academy of Sleep Medicine is a medical association whose professionals advocate for policies that improve sleep health. On Tuesday, the academy released a statement calling on the U.S. to eliminate daylight saving time completely, stating that standard time best supports health and safety, as it aligns with people's natural circadian rhythm. Undergoing the time switch itself raises the most concerns. Research shows that after the "spring forward" time change, workplace injuries, car crash deaths and heart attack risk have all increased. One 2023 study found that a week after transitioning from the time change, people reported more dissatisfaction with sleep and higher rates of insomnia.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from 404 Media: Spread across four computer monitors arranged in a grid, a blue and green interface shows the location of more than 50 different surveillance cameras. Ordinarily, these cameras and others like them might be disparate, their feeds only available to their respective owners: a business, a government building, a resident and their doorbell camera. But the screens, overlooking a pair of long conference tables, bring them all together at once, allowing law enforcement to tap into cameras owned by different entities around the entire town all at once. This is a demonstration of Fusus, an AI-powered system that is rapidly springing up across small town America and major cities alike. Fusus' product not only funnels live feeds from usually siloed cameras into one central location, but also adds the ability to scan for people wearing certain clothes, carrying a particular bag, or look for a certain vehicle.

404 Media has obtained a cache of internal emails, presentations, memos, photos, and more which provide insight into how Fusus teams up with police departments to sell its surveillance technology. All around the country, city councils are debating whether they want to have a system that qualitatively changes what surveillance cameras mean for a town's residents and public agencies. While many have adopted Fusus, others have pushed back, and refused to have the hardware and software installed in their neighborhoods. In some ways, Fusus is deploying smart camera technology that historically has been used in places like South Africa, where experts warned about it creating an ever present blanket of surveillance. Now, tech with some of the same capabilities is being used across small town America.

Rather than selling cameras themselves, Fusus' hardware and software latches onto existing installations, which can include government-owned surveillance cameras as well as privately owned cameras at businesses and homes. It turns dumb cameras into smart ones. "In essence, the Fusus solution puts a brain into every camera connected with the system," one memorandum obtained by 404 Media reads. In addition to integrating with existing surveillance installations, Fusus' hardware, called SmartCORE, can turn cameras into automatic license plate readers (ALPRs). It can reportedly offer facial recognition features, too, although Fusus hasn't provided clear clarification on this matter.

The report says the system has been adopted by numerous police departments across the United States, with approximately 150 jurisdictions using Fusus. Orland Park police have called it a "game-changer." It's also being used internationally, launching in the United Kingdom.

Here's what Beryl Lipton, investigative researcher at the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), had to say about it: "The lack of transparency and community conversation around Fusus exacerbates concerns around police access of the system, AI analysis of video, and analytics involving surveillance and crime data, which can influence officer patrols and priorities. In the absence of clear policies, auditable access logs, and community transparency about the capabilities and costs of Fusus, any community in which this technology is adopted should be concerned about its use and abuse."

David Shepardson reports via Reuters: The top members of a U.S. House committee on China are introducing a bill that seeks to ban the U.S. government from buying Chinese drones. Mike Gallagher, the Republican chair of the committee, and Raja Krishnamoorthi, the ranking Democrat, are introducing the "American Security Drone Act" on Wednesday, the lawmakers said in a statement to Reuters. "This bill would prohibit the federal government from using American taxpayer dollars to purchase this equipment from countries like China," Gallagher said. "It is imperative that Congress pass this bipartisan bill to protect U.S. interests and our national security supply chain."

The bill would also bar local and state governments from purchasing Chinese drones using federal grants and require a federal report detailing the amount of foreign commercial off-the-shelf drones and covered unmanned aircraft systems procured by federal departments and agencies from China. Krishnamoorthi said the bill "helps protect against any vulnerabilities posed by our government agencies' reliance on foreign-manufactured drone technology and will encourage growth in the U.S. drone industry."

Separately, the U.S. Senate on Tuesday unanimously approved an amendment proposed by Republican Senator Marsha Blackburn and Democrat Mark Warner that would prohibit the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) from operating or providing federal funds for drones produced in China, Russia, Iran, North Korea, Venezuela or Cuba. "Taxpayer dollars should never fund drones manufactured in regions that are hostile toward our nation," Blackburn said. China recently announced export controls on some drones and drone-related equipment, saying it wanted to safeguard "national security and interests." The U.S. Commerce Department in 2020 added dozens of Chinese companies to a trade blacklist, including the country's top chipmaker SMIC and Chinese drone giant DJI.

An anonymous reader shares a report: Microsoft has had a rough few years of cybersecurity incidents. It found itself at the center of the SolarWinds attack nearly three years ago, one of the most sophisticated cybersecurity attacks we've ever seen. Then, 30,000 organizations' email servers were hacked in 2021 thanks to a Microsoft Exchange Server flaw. If that weren't enough already, Chinese hackers breached US government emails via a Microsoft cloud exploit earlier this year. Something had to give.

Microsoft is now announcing a huge cybersecurity effort, dubbed the Secure Future Initiative (SFI). This new approach is designed to change the way Microsoft designs, builds, tests, and operates its software and services today. It's the biggest change to security efforts inside Microsoft since the company announced its Security Development Lifecycle (SDL) in 2004 after Windows XP fell victim to a huge Blaster worm attack that knocked PCs offline in 2003. That push came just two years after co-founder Bill Gates had called on a trustworthy computing initiative in an internal memo.

Microsoft now plans to use automation and AI during software development to improve the security of its cloud services, cut the time it takes to fix cloud vulnerabilities, enable better security settings out of the box, and harden its infrastructure to protect against encryption keys falling into the wrong hands. In an internal memo to Microsoft's engineering teams today, the company's leadership has outlined its new cybersecurity approach. It comes just months after Microsoft was accused of "blatantly negligent" cybersecurity practices related to a major breach that targeted its Azure platform. Microsoft has faced mounting criticism of its handling of a variety of cybersecurity issues in recent years.

According to Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo, Apple will start introductory production on the standard iPhone 17 in India, marking the first time the company begins development of a new iPhone outside of China. MacRumors reports: Apple will opt to assemble the standard iPhone 17 in India because it has a "lower difficulty" design that will minimize risk. Apple has been manufacturing older iPhones and other devices in India since for several years now in an effort to move more of its manufacturing out of China. Apple has slowly started giving factories in India more responsibility, and began iPhone 14 production in the country just a few weeks after the device launched in September 2022. iPhone 15 production started even earlier, with factories in the country assembling the base iPhone 15 model prior to launch, but assembly still started in China first.

As of now, Kuo believes that 12 to 14 percent of global iPhone shipments are made in India, with that proportion to increase to 20 to 25 percent by 2024. In addition to allowing Apple to move manufacturing away from China, increasing production in India provides Apple with an opportunity to strengthen its relationship with the Indian government. India is a key market for Apple due to growing demand for Apple products in the country.

Thomas Claburn reports via The Register: For a period of two years between September 2019 and September 2021, two Americans and two Russians allegedly compromised the taxi dispatch system at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York to sell cabbies a place at the front of the dispatch line. The two Russian nationals, Aleksandr Derebenetc and Kirill Shipulin, were indicted by a grand jury for conspiring to commit computer intrusions, the US Justice Department said on Tuesday. They remain at large. In early October, the two American nationals, Daniel Abayev and Peter Leyman, who were indicted last year, pleaded guilty, each to one count of conspiring to commit computer intrusions.

The scheme represented an attempt to monetize the demand among taxi drivers for lucrative airport fares -- the current flat rate for JFK to Manhattan is $70 plus additional charges. As described in the indictment (PDF), taxi drivers are required to wait in a holding lot at JFK, often for several hours, before being dispatched in the order of their arrival to airport terminals. And because time spent waiting in line is not paid, drivers have a financial incentive to avoid waiting in line. The conspirators allegedly developed a plan to hack the dispatch system around September 2019. The indictment describes several approaches that were tried, "including bribing someone to insert a flash drive containing malware into computers connected to the dispatch system, obtaining unauthorized access to the dispatch system via a Wi-Fi connect, and stealing computer tablets connected to the dispatch system."

The government's filing suggests that the group gained and lost access to the dispatch system several times. When they did have access, the alleged conspirators offered to move drivers to the front of the dispatch queue for a $10 fee, and waived the fee for those who found other drivers willing to pay to play. Many drivers took advantage of the service. According to the Justice Department, the group booked 2,463 queue cuts in a single week around December 2019. The scheme allegedly enabled as many as 1,000 trips per day that skipped the queue at JFK. The American conspirators are said to have collected the money from participating drivers and to have sent payments to the alleged Russian conspirators, describing the money transfers as "payment for software development" or "payment for services rendered." The indictment indicates that the Russians received more than $100,000 for their work. If apprehended -- which appears unlikely given current US relations with Russia -- the Russians face charges that carry a maximum sentence of ten years in prison. Abayev and Leyman each face up to five years in prison. They're scheduled to be sentenced early next year.

China's popular social media platforms are requiring "self-media" accounts with over 500,000 followers to disclose real-name information, prompting concerns over increased doxxing and privacy among some users. Reuters reports: China's most popular social media platforms on Tuesday announced that "self-media" accounts with more than 500,000 followers will be asked to display real-name information, a controversial measure that has prompted concerns over doxxing and privacy among some users. "Self-media" includes news and information not necessarily approved by the government, a genre of online content regulators have cracked down on in recent years to "purify" China's cyberspace. [...]

Rumors of the new policy had prompted lively debate among users. Some, like former state media editor Hu Xijin, have defended the measure as necessary in order to force influential accounts to use more responsible speech. Others, however, have expressed concerns that the measure would make doxxing easier and platforms would further remove online users' anonymity in the future.

The new measures will remove the anonymity of thousands of influencers on social media platforms that are used daily by hundreds of millions of Chinese. Several of the platforms said that accounts with over 1 million followers would be affected first and those that do not comply would face restrictions in their online traffic and income as a consequence.

Winter has come early for Apple, and it might last a while. From a report: The world's largest company by market value has become worth considerably less over the past three months. Apple's share price has slid 11% since the company reported its fiscal third-quarter results on Aug. 3, erasing nearly $400 billion in market value. It is hardly a typical swing given the fact that the company has long used the fall season to launch its biggest products for every year, including new iPhones. This is the first year since 2015 that Apple shares have lost ground between the company's key Worldwide Developers Conference in June and its fiscal fourth-quarter earnings report that typically takes place in late October.

That report is expected Thursday afternoon, and it will be the first to reflect sales of the iPhone 15 family that was launched in late September. Investors are worried that Apple's largest business is now facing new and potentially long-term threats. The growing geopolitical rift between the U.S. and China has finally caught Apple in its vortex, spurring reports of Chinese authorities considering a ban on the use of iPhones and other Apple devices by government employees. To make matters worse, Apple's old China-based rival Huawei appears to have made a comeback. The company launched a new smartphone called the Mate 60 Pro in September that reportedly is capable of 5G speeds, even though U.S. sanctions were supposed to deny the company the chips necessary for such an accomplishment.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Bloomberg: GSK will pay 23andMe $20 million for access to the genetic-testing company's vast trove of consumer DNA data, extending a five-year collaboration that's allowed the drugmaker to mine genetic data as it researches new medications. Under the new agreement, 23andMe will provide GSK with one year of access to anonymized DNA data from the approximately 80% of gene-testing customers who have agreed to share their information for research, 23andMe said in a statement Monday. The genetic-testing company will also provide data-analysis services to GSK.

23andMe is best known for its DNA-testing kits that give customers ancestry and health information. But the DNA it collects is also valuable, including for scientific research. With information from more than 14 million customers, the only data sets that rival the size of the 23andMe library belong to Ancestry.com and the Chinese government. The idea for drugmakers is to comb the data for hints about genetic pathways that might be at the root of disease, which could significantly speed up the long, slow process of drug development. GSK and 23andMe have already taken one potential medication to clinical trials: a cancer drug that works to block CD96, a protein that helps modulate the body's immune responses. It entered that testing phase in four years, compared to an industry average of about seven years. Overall, the partnership between GSK and 23andMe has produced more than 50 new drug targets, according to the statement.

The new agreement changes some components of the collaboration. Any discoveries GSK makes with the 23andMe data will now be solely owned by the British pharmaceutical giant, while the genetic-testing company will be eligible for royalties on some projects. In the past, the two companies pursued new drug targets jointly. GSK's new deal with 23andMe is also non-exclusive, leaving the genetic-testing company free to license its database to other drugmakers.

Citing an "unacceptable level of risk to privacy and security," Canada banned Chinese messaging application WeChat and Russian antivirus program Kaspersky on government-issued mobile devices. Reuters reports: The ban was announced after an assessment by Canada's chief information officer that Tencent-owned WeChat and applications made by Moscow-based Kaspersky "present an unacceptable level of risk to privacy and security," the Treasury Board of Canada, which oversees public administration, said in a statement. Kaspersky said it was surprised and disappointed, and that the decision was made without warning or an opportunity for the firm to address the government's concerns. "As there has been no evidence or due process to otherwise justify these actions, they are highly unsupported and a response to the geopolitical climate rather than a comprehensive evaluation of the integrity of Kaspersky's products and services," the company said in a statement.

The Treasury Board said it has no evidence that government information has been compromised, but the collection methods of the applications provide considerable access to a device's contents, and risks of using them were "clear." "The decision to remove and block the WeChat and the Kaspersky applications was made to ensure that government of Canada networks and data remain secure and protected and are in line with the approach of our international partners," the statement said. The applications will be removed from government-issued mobile devices on Monday, and users will be blocked from downloading them in the future.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from TechCrunch: After a weekend of almost complete internet blackout, connectivity in Gaza has been partially restored. On Friday, internet monitoring firms and experts reported that access to the internet had significantly degraded in the Palestinian enclave. The local internet service NetStream "collapsed," according to NetBlocks, a firm that tracks internet access across the world. At the same time, IODA, another internet monitoring system, showed outages and degradation across several Palestinian internet providers. The lack of internet communications caused emergency lines to stop ringing, made it hard for paramedics to locate the wounded, and for family members to reach relatives and friends, according to The New York Times.

On Sunday, IODA reported "marginal restoration" of internet connectivity in Gaza. Abdulmajeed Melhem, chief executive of the Palestinian main telecommunications company Paltel Group, told The Times that the internet had come back even though the company had not made any repairs. Then on Monday, Gaza had roughly the same access to internet connectivity as before Friday, according to several experts and firms that are monitoring the internet in the region, including Doug Madory, an expert who for years has focused on monitoring networks across the world. "There was the 34 hour complete blackout from Friday to Sunday -- a first for Gaza. Then there was last night's partial outage in northern Gaza," Madory, who is the director of internet analysis at Kentik, told TechCrunch on Monday. "The situation is still very precious: no power, little water. Service could potentially drop out again at any time." [...]

It's unclear what caused the internet outages in Gaza on Friday and what caused the improvements on Sunday and Monday. The Washington Post reported on Sunday that the U.S. government put pressure on the Israeli government to switch the internet back on in Gaza, citing an unnamed U.S. official. "We made it clear they had to be turned back on," the official said. "The communications are back on. They need to stay on," The Post quoted the official as saying. Also on Sunday, The Times reported that the U.S. government believed that the Israeli government was responsible for the near-blackout of the internet in Gaza.

A Russian-speaking hacking group obtained access to the email addresses of about 632,000 US federal employees at the departments of Defense and Justice as part of the sprawling MOVEit hack last summer, according to a report on the wide-ranging attack obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request. From a report: The report, by the US Office of Personnel Management, provides new details about a cyberattack in which hackers exploited flaws in MOVEit, a popular file-transfer tool. Federal cybersecurity officers previously confirmed that government agencies were compromised by the attack but have provided little information on the scope of the attack, nor did they name the agencies affected.

The Office of Personnel Management, in a July report on the incident submitted to a congressional committee, said an unauthorized actor obtained access to government email addresses, links to government employee surveys administered by OPM and internal OPM tracking codes. The impacted employees were at the Department of Justice and various parts of the Defense Department: the Air Force, Army, US Army Corps of Engineers, the Office of the Secretary of Defense, the Joint Staff and Defense Agencies and Field Activities.

An anonymous reader shares a report: PFAS stands for "per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances," a family of upwards of 15,000 or more human-made and incredibly durable chemical compounds that have been used in countless industrial and consumer applications for decades. Firefighting foams, waterproof hiking boots, raincoats, nonstick frying pans, dental floss, lipstick, and even the ink used to label packaging -- all can contain PFAS. The compounds are ubiquitous in drinking water and soil, even migrating to Arctic sea ice. PFAS are called forever chemicals because once present in the environment, they do not degrade or break down. They accumulate, are transferred throughout the watershed, and ultimately persist. The quest to reduce the amount of PFAS in the environment is what led me to an industrial park in a southern suburb of Grand Rapids, Michigan. The jar of PFAS concentrate in my hand is part of a demonstration arranged by my hosts, Revive Environmental, during a tour of the company's PFAS destruction site, one of the first in the country to operate commercially and at scale. A few yards in front of me sits the company's PFAS "Annihilator" in a white shipping container.

The Annihilator represents just one of several technologies now vying to break down and destroy PFAS. These span the gamut from established processes like electrochemical oxidation and supercritical water oxidation to emerging techniques relying on ultraviolet light, plasma, ultrasound, or catalyst-driven thermal processes. Some are deployed in field tests. Other companies are actively running pilot programs, many with various divisions of the US Department of Defense and other government agencies. And many other technologies are still undergoing laboratory research. There's good reason for this. Not only are PFAS everywhere around us; they're also in us. Humans can't break down PFAS, and our bodies struggle to clear them from our systems. Studies suggest they're in my blood and yours -- the majority of Americans,' in fact -- and they have been linked to increased risks of kidney and testicular cancer, decreased infant birthweights, and high blood pressure. And that's only what we know about now: researchers continue to grapple with the full impacts of PFAS on human and environmental health.