Lifeboat Foundation

It’s rare that Western disinformation efforts are discovered and exposed. This week, the Stanford Internet Observatory and social media analysis firm Graphika detailed a five-year operation that was pushing pro-Western narratives. The research follows Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram as they remove a series of accounts from their platforms for “coordinated inauthentic behavior.” The propaganda accounts used memes, fake news websites, online petitions, and various hashtags in an attempt to push pro-Western views and were linked to both overt and covert influence operations. The accounts, some of which appear to use AI-generated profile pictures, targeted internet users in Russia, China, and Iran, among other countries. The researchers say the accounts “heavily criticized” Russia following its nvasion of Ukraine in February and also “promoted anti-extremism messaging.” Twitter said the activity it saw is likely to have originated in the US and the UK, while Meta said it was the US.

#WesternPropaganda

Plus: An Iranian hacking tool steals inboxes, LastPass gets hacked, and a deepfake scammer targets the crypto world.

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To those that were part of the dot-com era tech scene, 2022 has a familiar energy. But now it’s all about the metaverse. And, just as they did in 1993 when the World Wide Web was launched into the public domain, many are asking themselves, “what is it, anyway?” What’s real, what’s hype and where are we headed?

The truth is, much like Internet 1.0 and all of its subsequent iterations, the metaverse is being defined as it’s being built. And contrary to what many believe, it’s more than just VR headsets and avatars. The metaverse is a place, an ecosystem, and above all else, an entirely new dimension. But to better understand this, it’s important to know how the metaverse is being developed.

One of the larger SpaceX disasters was eight months ago, a Falcon 9 was heavily damaged in rough high seas and there was a question of whether it would fly again. It was enough of a problem that SpaceX changed their landings to the Caribbean instead of the Atlantic Ocean during the winter to avoid high seas. (This reduced the amount of payload the rocket could support.)

Well, the rocket is going to fly again tomorrow as the 4th flight in a streak of at least 7 consecutive Starlink launches. SpaceX is launching faster and faster as their need for Starlink launches grows. They are hiring more technicians so they can launch faster from their 3 Falcon 9 launch towers.

SpaceX rolled a Falcon 9 rocket to its launch pad at Cape Canaveral and test-fired its engines Thursday, prepping for liftoff Saturday night carrying another group of Starlink internet satellites into orbit. The Falcon 9 booster has been repaired after a rough recovery in December knocked it out of SpaceX’s rocket reuse rotation.

Continue reading “NASA, Boeing target February for first crew flight on Starliner spacecraft” »

Increased demand for super tiny electronic sensors coming from healthcare, environmental services and the Internet of Things is prompting a search for equally tiny ways to power these sensors. A review of the state of ultracompact supercapacitors, or “micro-supercapacitors,” concludes there is still a lot of research to be done before these devices can deliver on their promise.

The review appeared in the journal Nano Research Energy.

The explosion of demand in recent years for miniaturized electronic devices, such as health monitors, environmental sensors and wireless communications technologies has in turn driven demand for components for those devices that have ever smaller size and weight, with lower energy consumption, and all of this at cheaper prices.

Future internet connection speeds – 2030, 2040, 2050. Predictions of future internet technologies and trends. What will the internet be like in 2050?

The number of vulnerability disclosures impacting extended internet of things (XIoT) devices increased by 57% in the first half of 2022 compared to the previous six months, according to a new report by Team82, the research team of cyber-physical systems (CPS) security firm Claroty.

The research also found that vendor self-disclosures increased by 69%. This would be a first for the industry, which usually relies more for disclosures on independent research teams. According to Team82, the trend indicates that more operational technology (OT), IoT, and internet of medical things (IoMT) vendors are establishing vulnerability disclosure programs and dedicating more resources to them.

Additionally, fully or partially remediated firmware vulnerabilities increased by 79% over the same time period, a significant improvement considering the relative challenges in patching firmware versus software vulnerabilities.

“These results will have future implications in forensic medicine and genetic diagnosis.”

In 1999, François Brunelle, a Canadian artist, and photographer, began documenting look-alikes in a picture series “I’m not a look-alike!”

The project, undoubtedly, was a massive hit on social media and other parts of the internet, but it also drew the attention of scientists who study genetic relationships.

Lastly, there is the concern that this is all whimsically unimportant, or worse, an obtuse disregard for more prosaic societal concerns. Some people may find debates of this sort to be pedantic and even snobbish, given the justified concern that advanced futuristic technologies are likely to benefit wealthy elites long before they trickle down to the masses. Worse, some people may expect that such technologies are likely impossible and that such metaphysical navelgazing is an ivory tower distraction in a world of real problems and challenges. To that reaction I say the importance is not necessarily in determining the prospects of technological and medical marvels that reside far in the future, if ever. The more relevant issue, and the reason I have committed so much of my life to contemplating and writing about these questions, is that we profoundly desire the most accurate model possible of reality and understanding of the human condition. Ultimately, we want to understand ourselves as conscious beings in the universe and to understand the nature of our existence. That is the real issue here, at least for me.

About the author

Keith Wiley is on the board of Carboncopies.org and is a fellow with The Brain Preservation Foundation. He holds a PhD in computer science from the University of New Mexico and works as a data scientist in Seattle, Washington. His book, A Taxonomy and Metaphysics of Mind-Uploading, is available on Amazon (https://www.amazon.com/dp/0692279849?tag=lifeboatfound-20?tag=lifeboatfound-20). His other writings, interviews, and videos about mind uploading are available on his website at http://keithwiley.com and elsewhere on the web.

The fastest way to track a fish is to use the cloud, figuratively speaking. A new acoustic receiver, developed by researchers at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) and published in the IEEE Internet of Things Journal, sends near-real-time fish tracking data to the digital cloud, providing timely information to dam operators and decision-makers about when, where, and how many fish are expected to pass through dams. Instead of relying on seasonal estimates of fish migration from previous years, these data from tagged fish support more informed decisions about dam operations that affect fish passage.

“This receiver provides up-to-the-hour data to dam operators to assist in making informed day-to-day decisions in support of fish passage, like adjusting water flow when it’s clear that a large group of juvenile fish are approaching the dam,” said Jayson Martinez, a PNNL mechanical engineer who co-developed the receiver.

Hydropower dams are an important source of dependable renewable energy, generating about six percent of total electricity in the United States. Helping fish navigate them safely is a key part of reducing dams’ environmental impact. The new receiver is a critical piece of the puzzle in the ongoing endeavor to improve fish passage.