A proposed addition to the existing Dutch Intelligence and Security Services Act would extend a warrant requested to intercept the communications of a specific hacking organization automatically to the victims of this hacking group. Or, more concretely, if your computer gets hacked by group X and there was a warrant to intercept the traffic of group X, the Dutch services would gain automatic approval to also intercept your communications or hack you.
Volunteers have been transporting the books and other precious documents, which became submerged in water and mud in flooded libraries in the worst-affected areas, to Cesena, where the items will be placed on shelves in temperatures of -25C in industrial-size freezers provided by Orogel, a company that specialises in frozen food.
Neuroscientists and neurosurgeons have re-established the communication between the patient's brain and spinal cord with a wireless 'digital bridge', allowing a paralysed person to walk again naturally. The device enabled him to regain control over the movement of his paralysed legs, allowing him to stand, walk, and even climb stairs, a report published in Nature says.
The study is here: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-023-06094-5
The entire academic board of the journal 'Neuroimage', including professors from Oxford University, King’s College London and Cardiff University resigned after Elsevier refused to reduce publication charges. Academics around the world have applauded what many hope is the start of a rebellion against the huge profit margins in academic publishing, which outstrip those made by Apple, Google and Amazon.
Sex in space is a real possibility with the expected growth in space tourism over the next decade, says a Cranfield University-led paper. This appears to pose several risks that have not yet been considered, those of a biological nature such as embryo developmental risks and those of a commercial nature such as liability, litigation, and reputational damage.
Race is a social concept, but it is often used in genomics and genetics research as a surrogate for describing human genetic differences. "This is misleading, inaccurate, and harmful", the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine in the US say as they propose a new framework for scientists.
The US has transferred two brothers from its Guantánamo Bay detention centre to Pakistan, bringing the total number of people held at Guantánamo down to 32. Guantánamo came to symbolise the excesses of the US “war on terror” because of harsh interrogation methods that critics have said amounted to torture.
If passed as written, it would preemptively ban the use of the COVID-19 vaccines made by Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna as well as countless other mRNA vaccines that are now in development, such as shots for RSV, a variety of cancers, HIV, flu, Nipah virus, and cystic fibrosis, among others.
The author and entrepreneur Raymond Baker accuses the US and China, which together account for over 40% of the world’s nominal GNP, of knowingly exploiting secrecy in global economic relations. Now, the COVID pandemic, the war in Ukraine and climate change even worsen inequality within and among nations.
[Highly recommended book if I may say so. I've read it, too, and although I don't agree in every aspect, Baker's arguments are very legitimate.]
The protests were sparked by cuts to monthly allowances paid to retirees under China’s vast public health insurance system. The changes, gradually introduced since 2021, come as local government finances are strained following years of strict and costly zero-Covid policies.
A new generation of younger, female, Indigenous, Black, Latinx and queer farmers are still contending with US land prices out of reach, and old attitudes that minimize a healthier, more sustainable food production. By focusing on voices not typically part of mainstream man-to-man economic discourse, however, their new approach celebrates an economy waged as life—not as war.
Rights groups accuse Beijing of abuses against Uyghurs, the ethnic minority that numbers about 10 million in Xinjiang, including the mass use of forced labour in internment camps. China is also alleged to have forcibly sterilised women in the province.
Engineers re-created one of Leonardo's experiments with a modern apparatus and found he produced a value for the gravitational constant, G, to around 97 percent accuracy. What makes this finding even more astonishing is that Leonardo achieved this without a means of accurate timekeeping and without the benefit of calculus, which Newton invented only around 150 years after Leonardo's death.
The former Conservative party leader Iain Duncan Smith said that the governor of Xinjiang, Erkin Tuniyaz, should be arrested if he arrives in the UK. Tuniyaz, who is due to visit the UK next week and may meet officials, is accused of overseeing widespread attacks against the Uyghur ethnic group and other Turkic Muslims in Xinjiang.
Erkin Tuniyaz, the Chinese Communist Party deputy secretary in Xinjiang and chairman of the Xinjiang government, who is slated to meet with UK and EU officials in February, gave a speech in 2018 in which he instructed officials to ensure that “absolutely secure” measures were adopted to prevent people from escaping from political education camps and police detention facilities. The US sanctioned Tuniyaz in 2021 for his role in Xinjiang abuses.
"What they're accusing Julian of, they could accuse [...] any other journalist, any other publisher, any day they choose. ... If we want an open and accountable democracy, where you can expose corruption and criminality, if that is the society that we want, Julian has to be free", his wife Stella Assange said.
The US football forward Alex Morgan has questioned the possible sponsorship deal between the world's football federation Fifa and Saudi Arabia’s tourism authority for the upcoming Women’s World Cup in Australia and New Zealand this summer. Both host countries' federations have also decried the move because of Saudi Arabia’s human rights record, especially when it comes to women and LGBTQ individuals.
The 32 year old Afghan, who completed his MSc at a leading university last year, despite spending more than a year in a succession of single hotel rooms with his wife and two children under the age of three, now says he is having to choose between an academic career or a place to live.
The search for the missing capsule captured the world’s imagination, but radioactive material goes awol about 100 times a year around the world, says Dr Edward Obbard, a senior lecturer in nuclear engineering at UNSW Sydney.
Experts of the Technical University Delft found that out of six public statements made by the Commission in support of its new measures legislative initiative, three were incorrect.
Czech lower house of parliament speaker Marketa Pekarova Adamova assured Taiwan of her country's support for partner states who respect human rights and liberal democracy, ahead of a visit to Taipei planned for March this year. The election of new president Petr Pavel marks a turnaround in his countries politics, observers say.
“To the Chinese government, normalising the relationship means Australia first conforming to various Chinese government demands, including putting issues like human rights in Xinjiang off the table,” says Kyinzom Dhongdue, a strategic campaigns lead for Amnesty International Australia and a Tibetan human rights campaigner. He claims, however, that any human rights dialogue “must take place unconditionally”.
The Conservative Rami Ranger has been accused of using “deplorable” and “racially charged language” in a scathing attack on the BBC’s recent documentary about the Indian prime minister, Narendra Modi. He hit out at a documentary that has caused significant controversy in India and been banned from YouTube and Twitter by authorities there over the depiction of Modi’s role in riots in 2002.
Hongkongers in Britain have called on Suella Braverman to reconsider controversial measures in her public order bill, which they likened to the repressive measures used to crack down on democratic opposition in their home city.
Autocrats and dictators quickly acquire new arms technologies from abroad and often use them against their own citizens. A new study covering all countries from 1820 to 2010 shows that the spread of military technologies inhibits democratic reform.
Here is the study: https://academic.oup.com/ej/article/133/650/728/6750008?login=false
The government-affiliated civil organization CÖF (Civil Cooperation Forum), which operates with money from a state-owned gambling service provider, attacked the opposition through posters. In a recent press conference, a CÖF spokesperson said that Átlátszó could pose a national security risk by receiving financial support from foreign partners.
While attacking journalist Jamal Khashoggi, who wrote critically of the Saudi government and was killed in October 2018 by a group of assassins, Republican politician Mike Pompeo notes in his new book that the U.S. has a "strategic" relationship with the Saudis to consider.
Trying to commemorate those killed by Russian bombing in Dnipro, Ukraine. In Moscow, a 15-year old girl was detained for bringing flowers to the memorial of famous Lesya Ukrainka.
US president Joe Biden has been accused of hypocrisy for demanding the release of journalists detained around the world while he continues seeking the extradition of the WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange from Britain to face American espionage charges.
Hody Childress, a farmer and US air force veteran, began his anonymous charitable campaign when he walked into a drug store in his home town of Geraldine in 2012 and learned from the owner that sometimes families can’t afford to pay for their medicines.
Chinese cyber authorities have announced an internet censorship crackdown to ensure there are no “gloomy sentiments” caused by pandemic “rumours” during the lunar new year festival.
A video, purported to be of Cao Zhixin, a 26-year-old editor at Peking University Press, began spreading online on Monday. Cao said she recorded the video after several friends were detained, and gave it then to unnamed persons with instructions to publish it if she were arrested.
Super-rich outstrip their extraordinary grab of half of all new wealth in past decade, according to UK's Oxfam. A tax of up to 5 percent on the world’s multi-millionaires and billionaires could raise $1.7 trillion a year, enough to lift 2 billion people out of poverty.
The government asked King Charles for permission to pass its post-Brexit “world-leading” Environment Act because laws requiring landowners to enhance conservation could affect his business interests.
I don’t know where you live, but I agree we should never be whining about a country and its people. To critisize the government if there’s a reason, but never the people. A country’s government and its people are not the same.
Yes, but there’s one detail in the article I find weird if I may say so. It reads that the Biden administration “helped negotiate” a deal, but in fact they passed a bill. That’s a far tougher (indeed, it’s the toughest) level of reaching an agreement that has nothing to do with a negotiation.
This is sadly true. Sometimes I feel it is even worse. People could use products like LibreOffice for a donation of their choice or even for free if they want to, but they rather pay for Microsoft 365. I don’t understand that.
The vast majority of economists and analysts are doing a good job imo. They know that each model has its limits, and they clearly say that in their papers.
I feel the problems often arise after the research gets published and an armada of interest groups are trying to “interpret” the results according to their needs and wants. We frequently see lobbyists picking and choosing only the details that support their views, politicians seeking simple and quick solutions to complex long-term issues, and journalists and “bloggers” quoting studies without reading them.
Those interested in this kind of research and game theory in particular may also be interested in playing a small game developed by Nicky Case (~ 30 minutes): https://ncase.me/trust/
Have fun :-)
Italiano
Compare Alex Morgan’s statements now to her male colleagues’ behaviour during the football world cup in Qatar last year …