Skip to main content

Home/ Indie Nation/ Group items tagged technology

Rss Feed Group items tagged

John Lemke

BGU Students Develop Thought-Controlled, Hands-Free Computer For The Disabled - 0 views

  •  
    BGU software engineering students have developed innovative technology that could enable people to operate a computer without using a keyboard or mouse - only their brainwaves. While there have been previous attempts to develop devices to read brainwaves and operate specific programs, they were cumbersome and not feasible outside of a laboratory setting. The BGU technology features a helmet equipped with 14 EEG connect points that sense brain activity. According to Dr. Rami Puzis, "The technology is designed to assist those who are physically disabled who might otherwise be unable to manipulate a computer mouse or keyboard." The student team, Ori Ossmy, Ofir Tam and Ariel Rozen, developed the prototype application for their bachelor's degree project under supervision at BGU by Prof. Mark Last, Dr. Rami Puzis, Prof. Yuval Elovich and Dr. Lior Rokah. As part of a recent demonstration, a student composed and sent a hands-free e-mail using only thought combined with the adaptive hardware. The students and BGU team plan to continue research working with the disabled.
John Lemke

'Smartware' clothing could signal impending epileptic seizures - 0 views

  • They are currently working on 'smartware', fabrics that treat chronic wounds that result from diabetes and leg ulcers. Their 'senseware' technology, which is motion sensors found inside textiles, can give medical professionals the tools they need to detect the onset of epileptic seizures. The centre's 'bioware' technology is embedded materials and surfaces found in the home and on the body.
  •  
    "They are currently working on 'smartware', fabrics that treat chronic wounds that result from diabetes and leg ulcers. Their 'senseware' technology, which is motion sensors found inside textiles, can give medical professionals the tools they need to detect the onset of epileptic seizures. The centre's 'bioware' technology is embedded materials and surfaces found in the home and on the body."
John Lemke

White House releases trusted Internet ID plan - security, government, Google, Gary Lock... - 0 views

  •  
    The U.S. government will coordinate private-sector efforts to create trusted identification systems for the Internet, with the goal of giving consumers and businesses multiple options for authenticating identity online, according to a plan released by President Barack Obama's administration. The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) will work with private companies to drive development and adoption of trusted ID technologies, White House officials said. The National Strategy for Trusted Identities in Cyberspace (NSTIC), released by the Department of Commerce on Friday, aims to protect the privacy and security of Internet users by encouraging a broad online authentication market in the U.S. "The fact is that the old password and username combination we often use to verify people is no longer good enough," Commerce Secretary Gary Locke said at an NSTIC release event hosted by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. "It leaves too many consumers, government agencies and businesses vulnerable to ID and data theft."
John Lemke

Apple CarPlay debuts with Ferrari, Mercedes-Benz and Volvo | Technology | theguardian.com - 0 views

  • Ferrari, Mercedes-Benz and Volvo as the first partners to build it into their vehicles.
  • connect iPhones into in-car information and entertainment systems
  • in-car equivalent to Apple’s AirPlay technology in the living room.
  • ...1 more annotation...
  • The company said today it also has deals with 13 more manufacturers to integrate CarPlay in the future: BMW Group, Ford, General Motors, Honda, Hyundai Motor Company, Jaguar Land Rover, Kia Motors, Mitsubishi Motors, Nissan Motor Company, PSA Peugeot Citroën, Subaru, Suzuki and Toyota Motor Corp.
John Lemke

Exclusive: Secret contract tied NSA and security industry pioneer | Reuters - 0 views

  • Documents leaked by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden show that the NSA created and promulgated a flawed formula for generating random numbers to create a "back door" in encryption products, the New York Times reported in September. Reuters later reported that RSA became the most important distributor of that formula by rolling it into a software tool called Bsafe that is used to enhance security in personal computers and many other products.Undisclosed until now was that RSA received $10 million in a deal that set the NSA formula as the preferred, or default, method for number generation in the BSafe software, according to two sources familiar with the contract. Although that sum might seem paltry, it represented more than a third of the revenue that the relevant division at RSA had taken in during the entire previous year, securities filings show.
  • RSA, meanwhile, was changing. Bidzos stepped down as CEO in 1999 to concentrate on VeriSign, a security certificate company that had been spun out of RSA. The elite lab Bidzos had founded in Silicon Valley moved east to Massachusetts, and many top engineers left the company, several former employees said.And the BSafe toolkit was becoming a much smaller part of the company. By 2005, BSafe and other tools for developers brought in just $27.5 million of RSA's revenue, less than 9% of the $310 million total."When I joined there were 10 people in the labs, and we were fighting the NSA," said Victor Chan, who rose to lead engineering and the Australian operation before he left in 2005. "It became a very different company later on."By the first half of 2006, RSA was among the many technology companies seeing the U.S. government as a partner against overseas hackers.New RSA Chief Executive Art Coviello and his team still wanted to be seen as part of the technological vanguard, former employees say, and the NSA had just the right pitch. Coviello declined an interview request.An algorithm called Dual Elliptic Curve, developed inside the agency, was on the road to approval by the National Institutes of Standards and Technology as one of four acceptable methods for generating random numbers. NIST's blessing is required for many products sold to the government and often sets a broader de facto standard.RSA adopted the algorithm even before NIST approved it. The NSA then cited the early use of Dual Elliptic Curve inside the government to argue successfully for NIST approval, according to an official familiar with the proceedings.RSA's contract made Dual Elliptic Curve the default option for producing random numbers in the RSA toolkit. No alarms were raised, former employees said, because the deal was handled by business leaders rather than pure technologists.
  • Within a year, major questions were raised about Dual Elliptic Curve. Cryptography authority Bruce Schneier wrote that the weaknesses in the formula "can only be described as a back door."
John Lemke

The Land Walker: the world's first 340cm bipedal exoskeleton - 0 views

  •  
    Japanese machinery and robotics manufacturer Sakakibara-Kikai has released the first genuine bi-pedal exoskeleton - a landmark event and one which is certain to attract a lot of attention for the company. Mechanatrons and BattleMechs have long been the subject of scifi books, comics and movies with the promise of cyborg technology popularised by the smash sixties television series "The Six Million Dollar Man." We've previously seen some celebrated exoskeletons in films such as Alien (Sigourney Weaver's Ripley takes out the Queen alien in an exoskeleton), Star Wars (the AT-ST Imperial Scout Walker) and RoboCop (the ED209), but until now, the nearest thing we've seen in the metal was the 3.5 metre superhero exoskeleton Enryu from Tmsuk in Japan. Sakakibara-Kikai's Land Walker is just a tad shorter than Enryu at 3.4 metres, weighs 1000kg and shuffles along at 1.5kmh. Enryu is a lot faster than Land Walker but uses caterpillar-like tracks rather than legs to perform its chores - the strapping 3.5 metre Enryu will be called upon to rush into burning buildings, lift heavy objects and rescue people.
John Lemke

Roxxxy the US$7,000 companion/sex robot (NSFW) - 0 views

  •  
    When it comes to technology, the sex industry is no laggard, and as robots become more human-like in their appearance and abilities, US-based company TrueCompany is poised to launch Roxxxy - the world's first sex robot - that has many more capabilities than your average sex doll. Apart from having better defined physical features than previous dolls, Roxxxy has been programmed with her own personality and her manufacturers say she can listen, talk, carry on a conversation, feel your touch and respond to it, as well as move her private areas inside when she is being "utilized" to deliver an unforgettable erotic experience. There are even plans for a male version - Rocky the Robot.
John Lemke

Google has poached an expert scientist to build a quantum computer | The Verge - 0 views

  • the next step in computing technology
  • But the technology took a hit earlier this year when tests on the world's first commercially available quantum computer — the D-Wave 2, priced at around $15 million — appeared to show that it was no faster than a standard computer.
John Lemke

September 11, 2012: Opus audio codec is now RFC6716, Opus 1.0.1 reference source released - 0 views

  • Free and Open Another reason there are so many audio codecs: silly licensing restrictions. Would you base a business on technology a competitor controls? That's why the Opus specification and complete source are Free, Open, and available for any use whatsoever without IP restrictions, explicit licensing or royalties. Opus was developed and tested in a public, fully transparent process within the IETF, proof that open collaboration can produce a better audio codec than proprietary, secretive, patent-encumbered systems. Open standards benefit-- and benefit from-- open source organizations and traditional commercial software companies alike. Opus itself is the result of a collaboration including Broadcom, Google, the IETF, Microsoft (through Skype), Mozilla, Octasic and Xiph.Org.
John Lemke

Toyota shows off all solid state lithium superionic conductor based prototype battery - 0 views

  • last year the company described a prototype solid state lithium superionic conductor battery in an article in the journal Nature Materials that was based on a three dimensional framework. And just this month the company announced plans to introduce several new lines of hybrid and all electric vehicles over the next three years (after also announcing that the Prius hybrid now accounts for ten percent of all sales). The sticking point has been and remains, the batteries used in such vehicles which can account for up to half their cost to consumers.
  • The new battery, first described last year, uses Li10GeP2S12 in a layered three dimensional framework where cells are sandwiched together to create a stack of seven tiers with each having a voltage of four volts for a total of twenty eight at normal temperatures. The result, they say is a battery with five times the output density of previous varieties. To demonstrate its progress in refining the battery, the prototype was demonstrated recently to a group attending a green technology seminar as a power source for an electric scooter.
John Lemke

Yahoo webcam images from millions of users intercepted by GCHQ | World news | theguardi... - 0 views

  • Britain's surveillance agency GCHQ, with aid from the US National Security Agency, intercepted and stored the webcam images of millions of internet users not suspected of wrongdoing, secret documents reveal.
  • between 2008 and 2010
  • Optic Nerve, the documents provided by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden show, began as a prototype in 2008 and was still active in 2012, according to an internal GCHQ wiki page accessed that year.The system, eerily reminiscent of the telescreens evoked in George Orwell's 1984, was used for experiments in automated facial recognition, to monitor GCHQ's existing targets, and to discover new targets of interest. Such searches could be used to try to find terror suspects or criminals making use of multiple, anonymous user IDs
  • ...1 more annotation...
  • Optic Nerve was based on collecting information from GCHQ's huge network of internet cable taps, which was then processed and fed into systems provided by the NSA. Webcam information was fed into NSA's XKeyscore search tool, and NSA research was used to build the tool which identified Yahoo's webcam traffic.
John Lemke

Rep. Goodlatte Slips Secret Change Into Phone Unlocking Bill That Opens The DMCA Up For... - 0 views

  • Because of section 1201 of the DMCA, the "anti-circumvention" provision, companies have been abusing copyright law to block all sorts of actions that are totally unrelated to copyright. That's because 1201 makes it illegal to circumvent basically any "technological protection measures." The intent of the copyright maximalists was to use this section to stop people from breaking DRM. However, other companies soon distorted the language to argue that it could be used to block certain actions totally unrelated to copyright law -- such as unlocking garage doors, ink jet cartridges, gaming accessories... and phones
  • Separately, every three years, the Librarian of Congress gets to announce "exemptions" to section 1201 where it feels that things are being locked up that shouldn't be. Back in 2006, one of these exemptions involved mobile phone unlocking.
  • Every three years this exemption was modified a bit, but in 2012, for unexplained reasons, the Librarian of Congress dropped that exemption entirely, meaning that starting in late January of 2013, it was possible to interpret the DMCA to mean that phone unlocking was illegal. In response to this there was a major White House petition -- which got over 100,000 signatures, leading the White House to announce (just weeks later) that it thought unlocking should be legal -- though, oddly, it seemed to place the issue with the FCC to fix, rather than recognizing the problem was with current copyright law.
  • ...2 more annotations...
  • While this gives Goodlatte and other maximalists some sort of plausible deniability that this bill is making no statement one way or the other on bulk unlocking, it certainly very strongly implies that Congress believes bulk unlocking is, in fact, still illegal. And that's massively problematic on any number of levels, in part suggesting that the unlocker's motives in unlocking has an impact on the determination under Section 1201 as to whether or not it's legal. And that's an entirely subjective distinction when a bill seems to assume motives, which makes an already problematic Section 1201 much more problematic. Without that clause, this seemed like a bill that was making it clear that you can't use the DMCA to interfere with an issue that is clearly unrelated to copyright, such as phone unlocking. But with this clause, it suggests that perhaps the DMCA's anti-circumvention clause can be used for entirely non-copyright issues if someone doesn't like the "motive" behind the unlocker.
  • Unfortunately, the bill was deemed so uncontroversial that it's been listed on the suspension calendar of the House, which is where non-controversial bills are put to ensure quick passage. That means that, not only did Goodlatte slip in a significant change to this bill that impacts the entire meaning and intent of the bill long after it went through the committee process (and without informing anyone about it), but he also got it put on the list of non-controversial bills to try to have it slip through without anyone even noticing.
John Lemke

Google launches the Android-based Open Automotive Alliance with Audi, Honda, GM, and mo... - 0 views

  • GM, Honda, Audi, Hyundai, and chipmaker Nvidia, and will focus on bringing the successful mobile operating system to in-car entertainment systems
  • planned for launch by the end of 2014.
  • Sync system found in Fords is based on Microsoft technology
  • ...1 more annotation...
  • Car companies don't appear to be choosing just one partner either — Honda is already involved in Apple's efforts, while, Chevrolet, a division of Google's newly announced partner GM, recently demonstrated an app store and in-car interface for its 2015 lineup.
John Lemke

Hackers charged with stealing Xbox, 'Call of Duty,' and US Army secrets worth over $100... - 0 views

  • Four hackers have been jointly charged with conspiracies to commit computer fraud, copyright infringement, wire fraud, mail fraud, identity theft, and theft of trade secrets. Individually, they have been charged with counts of aggravated identity theft, unauthorized computer access, copyright infringement, and wire fraud.
  • The defendants, aged between 18 and 28, are believed to have stolen more than $100 million in intellectual property and other proprietary data from the likes of Microsoft Corporation, Epic Games, Valve, and even the US Army. This includes pre-release versions of Gears of War 3 and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, Apache helicopter simulation software developed for the US army, and information about the Xbox One console. Two of the suspects have pleaded guilty, one of which is 22-year old David Pokora. His plea represents what may be the first conviction of a foreign-based individual for hacking into US businesses to steal trade secret information.
  • 18-count superseding indictment
John Lemke

Ask Ethan #55: Could a Manned Mission to Mars Abort? - Starts With A Bang! - Medium - 0 views

  • No humans have ever traveled farther away from Earth than the crew of Apollo 13 did, as they circled around the far side of the Moon close to lunar apogee, achieving a maximum distance of 400,171 km above the Earth’s surface on April 15, 1970. But when the first manned spaceflight to another planet occurs, that record will be shattered, and in a mere matter of days.
  • The way we currently reach other worlds with our present technology — or any remote location in the Universe — involves three distinct stages:The initial launch, which overcomes the Earth’s gravitational binding energy and starts our spacecraft off with a reasonably large (on the order of a few km/s) velocity relative to the Earth’s motion around the Sun.On-board course corrections, where very small amounts of thrust accelerate the spacecraft to its optimal trajectory.And gravity assists, where we use the gravitational properties of other planets in orbit around the Sun to change our spacecraft’s velocity, either increasing or decreasing its speed with every encounter.It’s through the combination of these three actions that we can reach any location — if we’re patient and we plan properly — with only our current rocket technology.
    • John Lemke
       
      How we can do it now, if we plan right.
  • The initial launch is a very hard part right now. It takes a tremendous amount of resources to overcome the Earth’s gravitational pull, to accelerate a significant amount of mass to the Earth’s escape velocity, and to raise it all the way up through the Earth’s atmosphere.
  • ...2 more annotations...
  • The most optimal one for a one-way trip to Mars, for those of you wondering, that minimizes both flight time and the amount of energy needed, involves simply timing your launch right.
    • John Lemke
       
      The cheapest and the fastest. The one way ticket option.
  • When a planet orbits the Sun, there’s a lot of energy in that system, both gravitational energy and kinetic energy. When a third body interacts gravitationally as well, it can either gain some energy by stealing it from the Sun-planet system, or it can lose energy by giving it up to the Sun-planet system. The amount of energy performed by the spacecraft’s thrusters is often only 20% (or less) of the energy either gained-or-lost from the interaction!
    • John Lemke
       
      The transfer of energy involved to change speeds.
John Lemke

South Korean Scientists Use E. Coli to Make Gasoline - Korea Real Time - WSJ - 0 views

  • Using genetically modified E. coli to generate biofuel isn’t new. U.K. scientists said in April they have developed a process under which the bacterium turns biomass into an oil that is almost identical to conventional diesel–a development that followed similar research by U.S. biotechnology firm LS9 in 2010. But the breakthrough this time is important because the reprogrammed E. coli can produce gasoline, a high-premium oil product that’s more expensive than diesel if the biofuel becomes commercially viable, according to Prof. Lee Sang-yup at the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology. His team’s study was published in the international science journal Nature on Monday.
  • The significance of this breakthrough is that you don’t have to go through another process to crack the oil created by E. coli to produce gasoline. We have succeeded in converting glucose or waste biomass directly into gasoline,
  • only a few drops of the fuel per hour—making just 580 milligrams of gasoline from one liter of glucose culture.
John Lemke

This Internet of Things radio is the size of an ant | Ars Technica - 0 views

  • The radios are fitted onto tiny silicon chips, and cost only pennies to make thanks to their diminutive size. They are designed to compute, execute, and relay demands, and they are very energy efficient to the point of being self-sufficient. This is due to the fact that they can harvest power from the incoming electromagnetic signal so they do not require batteries, meaning there is no particular lifetime associated with the devices.
John Lemke

Spy court renews NSA metadata program | TheHill - 0 views

  • With a surveillance reform bill stuck in the Senate, the federal court overseeing spy agencies on Friday reauthorized the National Security Agency’s controversial bulk collection of Americans' phone records.
  • Given that legislation has not yet been enacted, and given the importance of maintaining the capabilities of the Section 215 telephony metadata program, the government has sought a 90-day reauthorization of the existing program,” the Justice Department and Office of the Director of National Intelligence said in a joint statement, referring to the section of the Patriot Act that authorizes the program.
  • The NSA’s phone records program needs to be reauthorized by the FISC every 90 days. The current authority expires on Dec. 5.
1 - 20 of 99 Next › Last »
Showing 20 items per page