Supersonic land speed record attempt is delayed again

As 2016 drew to a close, it appeared that the British-based Bloodhound team had everything they needed to finally break the world land speed record. Flush with funds following its biggest ever investment from China’s Zhejiang Geely Holding Group, Bloodhound looked to put past delays behind it by finally performing two runs over the course of 2017.

The first would be a “slow test” of its Rolls-Royce EJ200 jet engine, which would make way for an attempt at bettering the 763MPH (1228KMH) mark set by the Thrust SSC in October 1997. The banner event, however, has now been pushed back again, meaning we’ll have to wait until the second half of 2018 to see the Bloodhound push the boundaries.

According to Bloodhound SSC director Richard Noble, the team is still waiting on money from an unannounced global IT company and fashion brand to materialise. It also needs to improve the power output of its engines to support the car should it weigh more than first expected.

“This can easily happen as a design that has evolved over many years makes its way from the virtual world of Computer Aided Design to the real world of the racetrack,” said Noble. “The engineering team is choosing to be cautious now so we don’t lose time – or under perform – when we’re in the desert.”

The revised plan is to perform the static “tie-down” engine tests this summer and then get Bloodhound on the runway at Newquay Aerohub shortly after. If they go well, the team will then deploy in the Kalahari desert, on the mud and salt flats of Hakskeen Pan, in summer 2018.

At this point, it’s difficult to imagine the Bloodhound ever getting a runout. Since it was announced at London’s Science Museum in October 2008, the project has been beset by delays and cash flow issues. Noble remains optimistic, though: “Temporary delays do not change our direction of travel! 2017 will be a milestone year for The BLOODHOUND Project and we are determined to be out in South Africa, challenging records, next year.”

Via: BBC News

Source: Bloodhound SSC

Samsung Galaxy S8 specs fully revealed

We don’t have long to wait until the Samsung Galaxy S8 and Galaxy S8 Plus smartphones are officially unveiled – just until Wednesday 29 March – but it looks like we’ll know all the specifications of the SGS8 beforehand.

The website WinFuture claims to have the entire spec list for the smaller of the phones (and several press photos) so you can have a browse of these and see if there’s anything there that tickles your fancy.

• Samsung Galaxy S8: Release date, rumours and everything you need to know

Here then are the specifications for the Galaxy S8 – we can’t be certain they are the real deal until the Galaxy Unpacked event gets underway in a couple of days, but they match much of what we’ve heard so far:

Samsung Galaxy S8 specifications

• Display: 5.8-inch Super AMOLED, QHD 2960 x 1440
• Processor: Samsung Exynos 8895, 1.7GHz + 2.5GHz octa-core SoC
• Memory: 4GB of RAM
• Storage: 64GB, expandable via microSD card
• Cameras: 12-megapixel, f/1.7 (rear), 8-megapixel (front)
• Connectivity: 4G/LTE, Bluetooth 4.2 A2DP, apt-X, LE, NFC, WLAN 802.11a/b/g/n/ac, GPS
• Battery: 3,000mAh
• Measurements: 148.9 x 68.1 x 8.0mm, 151g
• OS: Android 7.0
• Price: From €799 (around £690)

WinFuture also claims that the Galaxy S8 Plus will cost from €899. The Plus model is likely to have many of the same specs as the smaller S8, but with with a larger screen, currently said to be 6.2-inches. Its resolution will be similar though – at QHD 2160 x 1440.

You can watch the Samsung Galaxy Unpacked event as it happens on Wednesday. Find out how here: Samsung Galaxy S8 launch: When is Galaxy Unpacked 2017 and can you watch it online?

NASA trains astronauts with zero-G virtual reality

To train ISS astronauts, NASA uses physical mockups, zero-G “vomit comet” airplane rides, neutral buoyancy (underwater) and other pricey and complex schemes. However, virtual reality has become a new option, allowing astronauts to do realistic training for things like maintenance in an accurate, simulated zero-G environment. The company that helped them build the sim, Epic Games’ Unreal Engine, recently unveiled a video showing exactly how that works.

NASA recently teamed with Oculus on Mission:ISS, a consumer education VR experience aboard the ISS. However, the training SIM NASA is developing with Unreal Engine is different altogether, and they appear to be using both the Oculus Rift and HTC’s Vive headsets.

The setup uses “cutting edge graphics and physics simulations to increase the sense of presence,” says NASA Software Engineer Matthew Noyes. “The more realistic the training feels, the faster you can respond in real-world, critical situations, which could save your mission or even your life.” As Ars Technica noted after trying it out earlier this month, the VR is realistic enough that it can even simulate blooming. When you look up at the digital “sky,” your pupils must dilate before you can see any stars, the same thing astronauts experience in space.

NASA ISS astronauts that have tried the sim say it closely matches what it feels like to handle objects in zero G. The training includes simulated maintenance, letting you use the Vive’s control wand to grab tools and other objects aboard the ISS. To make the mixed-reality simulation of gravity even more immersive, it also works with an “active response gravity offload system”, basically a crane that flies astronauts around to simulate zero, lunar or Mars gravity.

While this is still an (incomplete) NASA simulation, Noyes told Ars that the sim team was also working on a public release, though no dates have been discussed. The idea would be to create both a public outreach product alongside an actual SIM — something that might both inspire an train young wannabe astronauts.

Via: Techcrunch

Source: Epic Games

BT fined £42 million for fudging late broadband payments

Ofcom’s crackdown of BT and Openreach continues. The UK regulator has dealt the pair a £42 million fine for late broadband installations fitted on behalf of rival internet service providers, such as Sky and Virgin Media. Openreach handles the bulk of Britain’s broadband infrastructure — so to keep the market fair, it’s legally obliged to set up new lines within 30 working days. Inevitably, Openreach encounters problems and occasionally can’t meet that deadline. In exceptional circumstances, it can assume a contract extension by the ISP and reduce the compensation it would normally have to pay. However, Ofcom found that BT did this “retrospectively over a sustained period” to avoid fines. Tut-tut.

As the BBC reports, £42 million is a record fee for Ofcom. It would have been higher, however BT was given a 30 percent reduction because it admitted full liability, and agreed to set up a scheme to compensate the companies affected. “The size of our fine reflects how important these rules are to protect competition and, ultimately, consumers and businesses,” Gaucho Rasmussen, investigations director for Ofcom said. BT has also been fined £300,000 for its failure to provide information to Ofcom, both in this case and the Business Connectivity Market Review.

BT has apologised “wholeheartedly” for its mistakes, which Ofcom says occurred between January 2013 and December 2014. “This shouldn’t have happened and we fully accept Ofcom’s findings,” Clive Selley, CEO of Openreach said. “This issue is unrepresentative of the vast majority of work conducted by Openreach and we are committed to delivering outstanding service for our customers.”

The fine is one of many measures taken by Ofcom to clean up the UK’s internet, mobile and TV sectors in recent months. After a long and divisive review, it forced BT to spin off Openreach as its own, “legally separate” company. Last month, the regulator proposed plans that would cut BT landline rental for two million customers by £5 per month. The moves will, inevitably, be welcomed by BT’s rivals in the UK. For the company in question, however, it’s a pretty rough start to 2017. “We will make sure the same mistakes aren’t repeated in the future,” Selley added today.

Source: BT, Openreach

Moto G5 Plus review: The new standard for budget phones

The quick take

The Moto G5 Plus is an awesome little phone, and that it’s available for just over $200 is one of its greatest assets. Things could have gone either way for the Motorola brand under Lenovo, but it seems that the Moto G line has maintained what made it great in the first place: excellent hardware coupled with simple, unencumbered software, and a price tag that screams value.

The Good

• Solid build quality
• Snapdragon 625 gives effortless performance
• All-day battery life
• Restrained software touches
• Competitive price

The Bad

• Not all metal despite marketing
• Camera isn’t as good as advertised
• Heavily-advertised One Button Nav is a gimmick

Moto G5 Plus Specs

Operating System	Android 7.0 Nougat
Display	5.2-inch LCD 1920×1080 (424 ppi)Gorilla Glass 3
Processor	Snapdragon 625 2GHz octa-coreAdreno 506 GPU
Storage	32/64GB
Expandable	microSD card up to 128GB | microSD card up to 128GB
RAM	2GB / 4GB
Rear Camera	12MP, f/1.7, 1.4-micron pixels, dual AF pixels
Front Camera	5MP, f/2.2, 1.4-micron pixels
Connectivity	Wi-Fi 802.11n dual-bandBluetooth 4.2NFC (except U.S.)
Battery	3000mAhNon-removable
Charging	Micro-USB15W TurboPower charger
Water resistance	Water-repellant nano-coating
Security	Fingerprint sensor
Dimensions	150.2 x 74 x 9.7 mm
Weight	155 g
Colors	Lunar Gray, Fine Gold

About this review

This review was written after I (Daniel Bader) used the Moto G5 Plus for two weeks on the Rogers network in Toronto, Canada and the AT&T network in the U.S. It was running Android 7.0, on Build NPN25.137-33 with the January 1, 2017 security patch. The phone was provided by Motorola for review, and wasn’t updated through the course of the review period.

Moto G5 Plus Full review

The Moto G4 Plus was a pleasant surprise, a significant improvement from the company’s third effort, which had until that time maintained a steady stream of minor upgrades. The Moto G5 returns to that pace of slow-and-steady reinvention with an upgraded design that resembles the notion of premium without investing the entire way.

It has the same camera sensor as the Galaxy S7, but that doesn’t translate to the same photos.

At the same time, it neither brings back waterproofing — a popular feature in the third instalment — nor dual speakers, choosing to focus on what Motorola says are its customers’ two most important considerations when buying a phone today: the camera, and the build quality. (The phone does have a so-called water-repellant nano-coating which, while not preventing damage from water ingress, should be sufficient to allow the phone to get splashed or romantically caught in a rainstorm.)

The first issue is certainly addressed here, with the Moto G5 Plus gaining the same 12MP IMX260 sensor as the Galaxy S7, while the second comes in the form of a more compact, partly metal-clad chassis that, least in the Lunar Grey model I reviewed, exudes a professionalism that we haven’t seen from the series.

But other improvements abound, too: the phone’s screen is mercifully smaller than last year’s G4 series, shrinking to a more one hand-manageable 5.2-inches at 1080p — and the IPS LCD screen is really good. It’s probably the same quality as what you’d come to expect from a high-end flagship in 2014 or 2015, with excellent viewing angles, good but not class-leading brightness, and color calibration is, to my eyes, on par with devices double the price.

Below the screen is what, in my opinion, is the most important aesthetic change to the phone: the square fingerprint sensor in Motorola’s 2016 lineup has given way to an oblong with, mercifully, more surface area and a less interruptive aesthetic. I fully expect this to be transposed to the Moto Z line later this year, too. The single speaker and headpiece combo rests above the screen in an etch design that hasn’t changed in a number of years, with a 5MP front-facing camera to its right.

The phone’s bottom vexes. It contains a Micro-USB port that Motorola couldn’t offer an explanation for, other than it didn’t want to alienate long-time users of the series. We’ve had USB-C ports in budget phones for nearly a year now, with similarly-priced phones from Samsung and ZTE sporting the new universal port, so I don’t quite buy that argument. And while having to return to the single-orientation plug was jarring, it also wasn’t a problem; I have a million Micro-USB cords around the house, and the G5 Plus supports Quick Charge 3.0 through its Turbo Power charger, so I didn’t lose out in any way.

Turning the phone around marks the biggest departure in the G series’ design since its inception: we now have a metal back. While the backplate is removable on the cheaper Moto G5 (which isn’t coming to the U.S.), it’s fixed (good) on the more expensive model. Unfortunately, the extent of the metal ends there: the chrome sides, while metallic, are not metal, and there’s quite a marked distinction between the colors of both materials. As a result, the G5 Plus feels considerably less expensive than its initial impressions would have you believe.

To its credit, Motorola has always embraced with aplomb the compromise of material in its mid-range products. Since the first Moto G in 2013, the line has been unabashedly plastic, culminating in last year’s Moto G4 line, which found beauty in its plainness. I pick it up today and still like it.

When I pick up the Moto G5 Plus, I — and I don’t think I’m alone here, judging from other reviews — am confused. The phone feels like a facsimile of a more expensive product, but is betrayed by its chrome. The same problem was true of 2014’s Galaxy S5 — the difference is that that phone was $650; this is $230, and therefore much more forgivably chintzy. The design is also pedestrian; gone are the small touches that made a Moto phone a Moto phone, though admittedly those flourishes began disappearing in 2016’s Moto G lineup.

Motorola still can’t properly explain why it kept the Micro-USB port.

That said, the phone’s more diminutive frame is sensible, and it also manages to pack in the same-size 3000mAh battery as its predecessor despite being considerably thinner and shorter. The battery also lasts much longer than the G4 Plus’s, thanks to a super-efficient Snapdragon 625 processor that, when paired with either 2GB or 4GB of RAM, chugs along at a nice clip. I had a chance to use the phone as my daily driver for over a week, and noticed that it felt just as performant as the Galaxy S7 I came from (with a stop at the ZTE Blade V8 Pro in the middle, which also performs well for $230).

The difference is $60 between the 2GB and 4GB model, which also gives you an extra storage bump from 32GB to 64GB. I’d have loved a middle-ground option, a $250 version with 4GB of RAM and 32GB of storage, but hey, you can’t always get what you want.

Given that competitors like the Honor 6X and ZTE Blade V8 Pro go with 3GB as default, I think Motorola really did its base a disservice with its core configuration — especially if it wants the phone to last the two years for it claims to support — but I empathize with Lenovo’s budgetary restraints. That’s why I highly recommend either ponying up for the $299 version and forgoing that nice case or microSD card, or going with Amazon’s Prime Exclusive model, which offers a $45-60 discount in exchange for some lockscreen ads and pre-installed apps.

One thing the ZTE has that the Moto G5 Plus and Honor 6X lack is an NFC chip. This omission makes sense when Motorola rolls out the numbers around mobile payments adoption in the U.S., but here I am recommending you spend a bit more to future-proof your phone by spending money to upgrade the RAM and storage when neither version has the ability to perform mobile payments in the U.S. I find this to be a strange and frustrating decision; even if price would have precluded it from being on the lower-tier Plus model, it should be in the $299 version. To me, NFC is a basic requirement of any high-end smartphone, and if Motorola really wants to play in this league, it has to step up and compete.

Camera

What’s identical between both configurations is the 12MP camera, which, along with the metal back, may be the single biggest distinction over last year’s budget flagship, at least on paper. On paper, the phone has the same sensor and lens combination — a 12MP IMX260 with 1.4 micron pixels and an f/1.7 lens — as the Galaxy S7, but it lacks a few things to keep it at the top echelon of phone cameras. First, it doesn’t have optical image stabilization, which is a problem for low-light shots; and it lacks the advanced image signal processing bestowed on all phones running the more-expensive Snapdragon 820/Exynos 8890 chipsets.

Still, Motorola claims that the phone focuses considerably quicker than its predecessor, and I can confirm that to be true. The speed at which the Moto G5 Plus, even in low-light conditions, adjusts to the scene, is astonishing. And that focus speed is even more pronounced when you see the results achievable from the depth-of-field lens. And to accommodate that extra light, Motorola added a slightly wider lens, giving the photos a bit of extra breathing room compared to the average mobile camera. All good things.

The only situation the Moto G4 Plus performed better than its successor was in daylight photos, and only barely.

I also spent some time trying to corroborate others’ claims that the G5’s camera, arguably its biggest asset, is actually not as good as last year’s 16MP rear sensor inside the Moto G4 Plus. I put the two phones through the usual rigors of indoor and outdoor tests, with a few macro and low-light shots thrown in, and found that the Moto G5 Plus performed better in nearly every situation.

I did observe some softness, especially in macro subjects, but the low-light advantages — with a shaper lens, larger sensor and pixels, and improved ISP — made up for it. Indeed, the only situation the Moto G4 Plus performed better than its successor was in daylight photos, and only when zoomed in to 100%, since the extra four million pixels allow for the capture of greater detail.

Indoor movement: Moto G5 Plus (left) | Moto G4 Plus (middle) | Samsung Galaxy S7 edge (right)

Macro: Moto G5 Plus (left) | Moto G4 Plus (middle) | Samsung Galaxy S7 edge (right)

Low light: Moto G5 Plus (left) | Moto G4 Plus (middle) | Samsung Galaxy S7 edge (right)

Motorola still has one of the best camera interfaces out there.

I also compared the Moto G5 Plus to the Galaxy S7 edge, as they share fundamental camera components, and found that you do indeed get what you pay for. Or, another way to look at it, the same hardware nets very different results.

While I in no way expected the Moto G5 Plus to compete with the Galaxy S7, the bright spot is that it comes fairly close.

The Moto G5 Plus’s camera impresses in most situations. Its low-light results are certainly not comparable to the best phones out there today, but you’re unlikely to get much better from a $230 solution. And Motorola still has one of the best camera interfaces out there, with a simple set of options that hide a bevy of useful manual settings. And there is, as always, the useful double-twist-to-open-camera gesture that has been a mainstay of the Moto line since its inception.

Software

On the software front, the Moto G5 Plus continues Motorola’s art of minimalism. It runs Android 7.0 out of the box, it’s about as untarnished as you’re going to fight in this price range, too.

It has changed up the launcher to resemble the Pixel Launcher — you’ll remember that Moto phones always used the now-deprecated Google Now Launcher — which includes a swipe-up app drawer and homescreen access to Google’s Feed.

Elsewhere, Motorola’s signature feature, Moto Display, has been revamped to be more colorful and a bit more information dense. It’s still one of my favorite implementations of an ambient display, but year after year is becoming less essential as versions from Samsung, LG and Google close the gap.

One feature that Motorola is hoping will get a lot of attention is one that I discourage people to use. One Button Nav, as it’s called, eschews on-screen navigation keys for gestures using the fingerprint sensor. A left swipe for “back,” a right swipe for “multitasking,” and various lengths of taps and holds for “home,” screen off and Google Assistant. I tried using it, I really did.

I forced myself to adapt to it for three days — plenty of time to grow used to its idiosyncrasies. Instead, I found myself yearning for the touch-friendly simplicity of Google’s on-screen navigation keys. It wasn’t just that the swipes themselves were inconsistently registered — more than a few times a left swipe to go back would be registered as a tap to go home — but that I just found the benefits of extra screen space don’t nearly outweigh the additional cognitive load. It’s just not a great feature; worse, it’s a gimmick portrayed as one.

I tried using One Button Nav, I really did. But it’s just not very well implemented.

I do, however, want to be sensitive to Motorola’s demographic compromises here. The company is releasing a phone to compete with popular Asian brands like Oppo, Xiaomi, Vivo, and even Lenovo itself, most of which don’t use on-screen buttons, along with many big U.S. brands. One Button Nav, as imperfect as it is, is not for me, but for the millions of people that have never done it Google’s way. While I’m still not convinced this is the right way to do it, it’s certainly well done for what it is, and can be improved through subsequent software updates.

Battery life

Motorola has done an amazing job with battery life on this phone.

There are a lot of things I could nitpick about this phone, but that it doesn’t match the Moto Z Play’s epic uptime is not one of them. Motorola has done an amazing job getting the Moto G5 Plus to the point where I don’t have to worry about it dying on me before the end of the day, and it’s managed to do that in a chassis considerably thinner than its predecessor’s.

While I disagree with the company’s decision to maintain the legacy Micro-USB port, I can’t complain about the actual charging speed, which is Quick Charge 3.0-fast, nor the phone’s longevity, which handles everyday tasks with aplomb.

Which should you get?

In the U.S., you can’t buy the Moto G5 Plus from a carrier, so you’re going to be getting it unlocked at one of the company’s many retail partners, or directly from Motorola itself.

The two configurations are identical but for RAM and storage amounts:

• The $229.99 version comes with 2GB of RAM and 32GB of storage.
• The $299.99 version comes with 4GB of RAM and 64GB of storage.

I’m of the opinion that you should try to find the extra cash for the extra RAM, since we’ve found that Android runs better over the long run with more memory to work with. That said, as long as you keep your expectations in check, and clear your open apps every once in a while (or let the OS do it for you), you should be fine with the cheaper $229.99 model.

There’s also the Amazon Prime Exclusive offer, which gives a $45 and $60 discount, respectively, on the two models in exchange for lockscreen ads and pre-installed Amazon apps. I am not a fan of these particular devices, mainly because they are updated on a separate track and Motorola already has a pretty poor record, but the offer is a great way to bring down the cost of the more expensive Moto G5 Plus to $229.99.

Buy it

Moto G5 Plus Final Thoughts

This is probably the best $230 phone you can buy today, though the number of competitors in the space is quickly increasing. If companies like Honor and ZTE get their software acts together and stop shipping devices with older versions of Android, Motorola’s advantage will be quickly lost. At the same time, that Motorola is shipping the G5 Plus with Nougat, while good, does’t promise that it will get its own updates in a timely fashion, either. Lenovo has drained some of that efficacy in favor of cost savings.

But judged on its own merits, right now, the Moto G5 Plus is a really good product, and is great value. While I’d recommend springing for the 4GB model, either version is worthy of consideration, and has enough improvements over the G4 Plus to be considered a serious upgrade.

See at Motorola

You can share the taste of lemonade through the internet

Ever see a friend post a photo of a drink online and wonder whether it’s really as delicious as it looks? You might not have to pay a visit to find out: researchers have found a way to send the basic look and taste of lemonade through the internet. The team first used color and acidity sensors to get the characteristics of the drink, and then sent it to a connected tumbler full of water where LEDs replicated the color, and electrodes reproduced the sourness by stimulating drinkers’ tastebuds.

The result clearly isn’t the same as cloning the lemonade outright. Testers noted that this digital reproduction wasn’t as sour as the real thing. We’d add that lemonade is an ideal subject for a test like this, since it’s very simple and relatively easy to imitate.

However, that it’s close to the real thing is noteworthy by itself. If nothing else, the technology would give you a hint of what to expect from the real beverage. And the researchers have more ambitious plans. They’re developing a “cocktail” that would mimic the smell of a drink, and the ultimate goal is to share any drink. No, your laptop isn’t about to pour out a cold one any time soon, but you might soon know what you’re missing without having to leave home.

Source: New Scientist

Mass-produced artificial blood is now a real possibility

Doctors dream of having artificial blood always on hand, but the reality has usually been very different. While you can produce red blood cells in a lab, the current technique (which prods stem cells into action) only nets a small number of them at best. British researchers appear to have found the solution, however: they’ve developed a technique that can reliably produce an unlimited number of red blood cells. The trick is to create “immortalized” premature red blood cells that you can culture as much as you like, making mass production a real possibility.

The biggest challenge is translating the technique to commercial manufacturing. Scientists have produced a few liters of blood in the lab, but there’s a big difference between that and the massive volumes needed to serve even a single hospital. Although the UK’s National Health Service is planning to trial artificial blood this year, this new technique won’t be involved.

As it is, you wouldn’t likely see a wholesale switch to artificial blood even if this new method was ready for the real world. Any mass production is most likely to focus on people with rare blood types that can’t always count on donations. Even that limited effort could make a huge difference, mind you. Hospitals could always have a consistent supply of rare blood, so you wouldn’t have to worry about them running out in a life-or-death situation.

Via: BBC, Digital Journal

Source: University of Bristol, Nature

Wikileaks’ ‘Vault 7’ proves Big Brother and criminal hackers use the same tricks

Earlier this month, WikiLeaks unleashed the Vault 7 papers, a revealing insight into the tools and techniques used by the CIA. Their release caused a stir among the security community, but if you’re not working on the field, their relevance might not be immediately obvious.

Above all else, Vault 7 shouldn’t put you in a panic about the CIA — not if you’ve been paying attention, anyway. The most attention-grabbing techniques described in the papers aren’t anything new. In fact, they’ve been demonstrated publicly several times over. The revelation here is not the fact the CIA and NSA spy on both American and foreign citizens, but instead the incredible insight they – and presumably other spy organizations worldwide – have into cracking protections that most people consider secure.

A History of surveillance

“I would say that 100 percent of this is stuff that has been known to the security community for a while,” said Ryan Kalember, the senior vice president of cybersecurity strategy at security firm ProofPoint, in reference to the Vault 7 documents. “The Samsung Smart TV hack was demonstrated at security conferences several years ago, the vehicular hacks were demonstrated at BlackHat by quite a few different individuals on different vehicles.”

More: U.S. Justice Department charges two Russian spies and two hackers in Yahoo breach

“Most of the things that have come out are slight variations on known techniques,” agreed James Maude, senior security engineer at Avecto. “There are a few targeted workarounds for antivirus vendors that weren’t previously known about — although similar exploits have been found in the past — and there were a couple of newer techniques for bypassing User Account Control on Windows.”

Cancillería del Ecuador/Flickr

You don’t have to be a security professional to have heard about the techniques outlined in the Vault 7 papers. You might be surprised that the CIA is using these techniques, but you perhaps shouldn’t be, given that the organization was established for the purposes of gathering intelligence.

In the preface to the book Spycraft: The Secret History of the CIA’s Spytechs from Communism to Al-Qaeda, former director of the agency’s Office of Technical Service, Robert Wallace, describes the groups that comprised the organization when he joined its ranks in 1995. One was apparently responsible for the design and deployment of “audio bugs, telephone taps, and visual surveillance systems.” Another is said to have “produced tracking devices and sensors” and “analyzed foreign espionage equipment.”

The CIA is an organization that was set up for the purposes of surveillance and espionage. The Vault 7 papers aren’t revelatory in terms of what the CIA is doing — they’re revelatory in terms of how the agency is doing it. The way that the organization implements technology is changing with the times, and Vault 7 lets us track its progress.

Espionage evolves

Computers have revolutionized most industries over the past few decades, and that has in turn changed how spy organizations collect data from those industries. Thirty years ago, sensitive information typically took the form of physical documents, or spoken conversations, so spycraft focused on extracting documents from a secure location, or listening to conversations in room thought to be private. Today, most data stored digitally, and can be retrieved from anywhere the internet is available. Spies are taking advantage of that.

The lines have blurred between cybercrime and spycraft

According to Kalember, it’s “absolutely to be expected” that the CIA would move with the times. “If the information that you’re looking for exists in somebody’s email account, of course your tactics are going to move to spear-phishing them,” he explained.

Tactics like phishing might seem underhanded, in the reserve of criminals, but they’re used by spies because they’re effective. “There are only so many ways that you can get something to run on a system,” explained Maude. Indeed, if the CIA were to debut an unprecedented and highly effective method of snooping, it’s almost certain that criminal entities would be able to reverse-engineer it for their own usage.

“We’re in an environment where, particularly with the revelations from the Yahoo attack, the lines have blurred between cybercriminal tradecraft and spycraft,” said Kalember. “There’s one ecosystem of tools that has a big overlap.”

Intelligence operatives and cybercriminals are using the same tools for very similar purposes, even if their targets and their end goals might be very different. The practicalities of surveillance don’t change depending on the individual’s moral or ethical alignment, so there should be little shock when it emerges that the CIA is interested in a Samsung TV’s capacity to listen to conversations. In fact, exploits like that found in Samsung TV’s are of more interest to spies than to criminals. It’s not an exploit that offers immediate financial gain, but it does provide an excellent way to listen in on private conversations.

Aerial view of the CIA headquarters

“When we look at the CIA leaks, when we look at cybercriminal forums and the malware that I’ve looked at, the difference between a cybercriminal and an intelligence analyst is literally who pays their paycheck,” said Maude. “They all have a very similar mindset, they’re all trying to do the same thing.”

This melting pot allows operatives to disguise their actions, letting their work blend in with the similar tactics employed by criminals and other intelligence agencies. Attribution, or lack thereof, means that re-using tools developed by others doesn’t just save time — it’s a safer option all round.

Author unknown

“It’s well known within security circles that attribution looks great in reports and press conferences, but in reality, there’s very little value in attributing threats,” said Maude. “The value is in defending against them.”

The NSA has broad capabilities to gather up lots of different types of communications that are, by and large, unencrypted

Most surveillance is intended to be surreptitious, but even when an attempt is discovered, it can be very difficult to accurately trace it to its source. The CIA takes advantage of this fact by utilizing tools and techniques developed by others. By implementing someone else’s work — or better yet, a patchwork of others’ work — the agency can prompt questions about who’s responsible for its espionage.

“Attribution is something that has been a controversial subject in the private sector,” said Kalember. When security researchers are examining attacks, they can look at the tools that are used, and often where information was sent, to get an idea of who was responsible.

Delving further into the malware, it’s possible to get even great insight into its authors. The language used for text strings might provide a clue. The time of day that code was compiled might hint at their geographical location. Researchers might even look at debug paths to figure out which language pack the developer’s operating system was using.

Unfortuantely, these clues are easy to forge. “All of those things are well-known techniques that researchers can use to try and do attribution,” explained Kalember. “We’ve recently seen both cyber-criminal groups and nation state groups intentionally mess with those methods of attribution to create the classic false ‘flag type’ of scenario.”

He gave an example of the practice related to the malware known as Lazarus, which is thought to have originated in North Korea. Russian language strings were found in the code, but they didn’t make any sense to Russian speakers. It’s possible that this was a half-hearted attempt at misdirection, or perhaps even a double-bluff. The Vault 7 papers demonstrated that the CIA is actively engaging in this methodology to deceive those trying to track malware back to it.

“There was a big part of the Vault 7 leaks that focused on this program called UMBRAGE, where the CIA was pointing out the broad ecosystem of tools that were available for use,” said Kalember. “They appeared to be mostly trying to save themselves time, which a lot of people involved in this line of work do, by re-using things that were already there.”

UMBRAGE demonstrates how the CIA is monitoring trends to maintain its effectiveness in terms of espionage and surveillance. The program allows the agency to operate more quickly, and with less chance of being discovered — a huge boon to its endeavors. However, the Vault 7 papers also demonstrate how the organization has been forced to change its tactics to reassure those critical of its attitude towards privacy.

From Fishing Net to Fishing Rod

In 2013, Edward Snowden leaked a cavalcade of documents that unveiled various global surveillance initiatives being operated by the NSA and other intelligence agencies. The Vault 7 papers demonstrate how the Snowden leaks changed best practices for espionage.

“If you look at the Snowden leaks, the NSA has broad capabilities to gather up lots of different types of communications that were — by and large — unencrypted,” said Kalember. “That meant that without really being known to anybody, there was a tremendous amount of interesting information that they would have had access to, and they wouldn’t have had to take any risks to get access to any individual’s information that happened to be swept up in that.”

Put simply, the NSA was utilizing a widespread lack of encryption to cast a wide net and collect data. This low-risk strategy would pay off if and when a person of interest’s communications were intercepted, along with masses of useless chatter.

“Since the Snowden leaks we’ve really talked up the need for end-to-end encryption, and this has been rolled out on a massive scale, from chat apps to websites, SSL, all these different things that are out there,” said Maude. This makes widespread data collection far less relevant.

“What we’re seeing is that intelligence agencies are working around end-to-end encryption by going straight to the endpoint,” he added. “Because obviously that’s where the user is typing, encrypting, and decrypting the communication, so that’s where they can access them unencrypted.”

The Snowden leaks spearheaded an industry-spanning initiative to standardize end-to-end encryption. Now, surveillance requires a more precise approach, where the focus is on specific targets. That means accessing the endpoint, the device where the user is inputting or storing their communications.

Nothing digital is ever 100 percent secure

“The CIA’s Vault 7 leaks, by contrast to the Snowden leaks, describe almost entirely targeted attacks that have to be launched against specific individuals or their devices,” said Kalember. “They probably, in most cases, involve taking slightly greater risks of being caught and identified, and they’re much harder to do in purely clandestine terms, because it’s not being done upstream from where all the communications are occurring, it’s being done at the level of the individual and the device.”

This can be tracked directly to the Snowden leaks, via its status as a public service announcement regarding unencrypted communications. “The big thing that changed, that kind of precipitated this whole shift, was the rise of end-to-end encryption,” added Kalember.

What does this mean for the average person? It’s less likely that your communications are being intercepted now than it was a few years back.

The CIA and I

At the end of the day, worrying about the CIA spying on you as an individual is a waste of energy. If the agency has a reason to snoop on you, they have the tools to do so. It’s very difficult to avoid that fact, unless you plan to go entirely off the grid. Which, for most people, isn’t practical.

CIA

In a way, if you’re worried about the security of your data, the information included in the leak should be reassuring. With international espionage agencies and top cybercriminals using the same ecosystem of tools, there are fewer forms of attack to be concerned with. Practicing good security habits should protect you against the biggest threats, and some of the precautions you can take are simpler than you might expect.

A recent report on Windows vulnerabilities published by Avecto found that 94 percent of vulnerabilities could be mitigated by removing admin rights, a statistic that could help enterprise users keep their fleet of systems secure. Meanwhile, personal users can reduce their changes of being breached simply by looking out for phishing techniques.

More: Intel Security releases MacBook scanner for CIA Vault 7 rootkits

“The thing with security is that nothing digitally is ever 100 percent secure, but you know there are measures you can take that make your security much better,” said Maude. “What the CIA leak shows us is that the measures you can take to defend yourself against cybercriminals using common ransomware tools are broadly the same measures you can take to defend against the CIA implanting something on your system.”

The Vault 7 papers aren’t a call for panic, unless you’re an individual that the CIA might already be interested in investigating. If knowing that the CIA can listen to your conversations through your TV scares you, then it probably doesn’t help to hear that career criminals who make a living through extortion and blackmail have access to the same tools.

Fortunately, the same defenses work just as well against both parties. When matters of online security hit the headlines, the takeaway is usually the same; be vigilant and be prepared, and you’ll most likely be ok.

‘NBA Jam’ creator talks about Midway’s little-known history

If you hung around arcades in the 1990s, you were likely extremely familiar with Midway sports games like NBA Jam and NFL Blitz. Apparently, though, even these classics have a few secrets left. Former Midway design lead Mark Turmell has participated in a Reddit AMA where he revealed a handful of surprises about Midway games. For instance, he confirmed that pre-release versions of NBA Jam did have Michael Jordan — the developers had to yank him out just weeks before launch due to his Nike deal. In fact, there were custom editions given to Jordan, Ken Griffey and Gary Payton that put each of them in the game.

Other insights? The original NFL Blitz was initially poised to be more violent (you could kick players while they were down) until some animations were cut to get the league’s approval. Also, while the 2012 Blitz reboot was ultimately disappointing to Turmell, he notes that the team had “toyed” with making it a free-to-play multiplayer game that might have made it better.

Turmell also points out that, in some ways, the game industry hasn’t changed as much as you think. To him, arcade games and mobile games (his current focus) “perfectly match” each other. They’re easy to get into, are often difficult to master, and revolve around short bursts of action in return for a little cash. The biggest change is simply the resources you need to make a hit. While small game teams can still shine, you usually need hundreds of people to crank out a blockbuster.

Source: Reddit

Scientists find a low-cost way to build genomes from scratch

To put it mildly, sequencing and building a genome from scratch isn’t cheap. It’s sometimes affordable for human genomes, but it’s often prohibitively expensive (hundreds of thousands of dollars) whenever you’re charting new territory — say, a specific person or an unfamiliar species. A chromosome can have hundreds of millions of genetic base pairs, after all. Scientists may have a way to make it affordable across the board, however. They’ve developed a new method, 3D genome assembly, that can sequence and build genomes from the ground up for less than $10,000.

Where earlier approaches saw researchers using computers to stick small pieces of genetic code together, the new technique takes advantages of folding maps (which show how a 6.5ft long genome can cram into a cell’s nucleus) to quickly build out a sequence. As you only need short reads of DNA to make this happen, the cost is much lower. You also don’t need to know much about your sample organism going in.

As an example of what’s possible, the team completely assembled the three chromosomes for the Aedes aegypti mosquito for the first time. More complex organisms would require more work, of course, but the dramatically lower cost makes that more practical than ever. Provided the approach finds widespread use, it could be incredibly valuable for both biology and medicine.

In the case of the mosquito, scientists hope the genomes will reveal the vulnerabilities that let the Zika virus spread. You could see gene-modified mosquitoes that resist the virus and stop it from spreading. Alternately, this could uncover patient-specific genetic changes that expose humans to certain diseases — it wouldn’t be a mystery why one person falls ill while another is healthy. And when it’s relatively affordable to build a genome out of curiosity, biologists could catalog many species instead of the most vital examples.

Via: Quartz

Source: GEN, Science