New researches

Sunday, May 15, 2022

Resin 3D Printing, Open-Source Jobs, Twitter, More: Sunday ResearchBuzz, May 15, 2022

Resin 3D Printing, Open-Source Jobs, Twitter, More: Sunday ResearchBuzz, May 15, 2022
By ResearchBuzz

NEW RESOURCES

Hackaday: Open Database Shares Resin 3D Printing Settings. “3D printing is much like CNC milling or welding or just about any physical manufacturing process, in that good results fundamentally come down to having the right settings. In an effort to aid those working in the resin printing space, [Adam Bute] has put together a community database of resin printing settings. The site has sections relevant to a variety of resin 3D printers, sorted by manufacturer.”

ZDNet: A new job site just for open-source jobs opens its doors. “There are many online job sites for technologists. They include Dice, The Ladders, and Crunchboard. But, while there are open-source programs for job sites, such as Jobberbase, there are only a handful of sites specializing in open-source jobs. Now, there’s a new entry trying to become The site for open-source technology jobs: Open Source JobHub.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

The Verge: Twitter CEO pushes out top execs, freezes hiring. “Twitter is shaking up its top leadership. The first move came as consumer product leader Kayvon Beykpour announced on Twitter that current CEO Parag Agrawal ‘asked me to leave after letting me know that he wants to take the team in a different direction.’ Bruce Falck, the general manager of revenue and head of product for its business side, confirmed in a (now deleted) tweet that he was also fired by Agrawal.”

USEFUL STUFF

Lifehacker: How to Stop Annoying YouTube Bots From Spamming Everyone. “Bots and spam comments are nothing new on YouTube, but lately the website is overrun with fake accounts trying to scam viewers commenting on their favorite channels. These scam accounts use the same name and profile image as the YouTube channel they’re exploiting, and the bots attempt to trick other users into thinking they won a special prize, asking them to click a link or contact them via DMs or texting an external messaging app like WhatsApp or Telegram.”

AROUND THE INTERNET WORLD

Border Report: Say ‘no’ to coyotes: DHS turns to social media to keep migrants from coming to U.S.. “The U.S. government is using social media to deter people in Honduras and Guatemala from giving in to smugglers who promise them easy access to the United States. This week, U.S. Customs and Border Protection began distributing digital ads in platforms such as Facebook and WhatsApp.”

LifeSavvy: There’s Now a Wordle Game for Food Lovers. “By now, you’ve likely played Wordle at least once. The Hangman-esque game took the internet by storm earlier this year, and now there are all kinds of iterations, including one for foodies. Created by Julie Loria, a cookbook author, Phoodle works much like its predecessor. You guess the daily food-related word and get a new one tomorrow.”

BBC: The long struggle to return Cambodia’s looted treasures. “Cambodia is calling on the UK government to help it recover antiquities it says were stolen from its temples. The country’s culture minister says the Victoria & Albert and British Museums both have looted objects.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

CNET: Tech groups urge Supreme Court to block Texas social media law. “Two lobbying groups for Big Tech companies like Google, Meta and Twitter have asked the US Supreme Court to block a Texas law that prohibits large social media sites from banning users or removing posts based on political viewpoints.”

Ars Technica: Some top 100,000 websites collect everything you type—before you hit submit. “Researchers from KU Leuven, Radboud University, and University of Lausanne crawled and analyzed the top 100,000 websites, looking at scenarios in which a user is visiting a site while in the European Union and visiting a site from the United States. They found that 1,844 websites gathered an EU user’s email address without their consent, and a staggering 2,950 logged a US user’s email in some form. Many of the sites seemingly do not intend to conduct the data-logging but incorporate third-party marketing and analytics services that cause the behavior.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

MIT News: Technique protects privacy when making online recommendations. “Algorithms recommend products while we shop online or suggest songs we might like as we listen to music on streaming apps. These algorithms work by using personal information like our past purchases and browsing history to generate tailored recommendations. The sensitive nature of such data makes preserving privacy extremely important, but existing methods for solving this problem rely on heavy cryptographic tools requiring enormous amounts of computation and bandwidth. MIT researchers may have a better solution.”

The Next Web: DeepMind’s astounding new ‘Gato’ AI makes me fear humans will never achieve AGI. “DeepMind today unveiled a new multi-modal AI system capable of performing more than 600 different tasks. Dubbed Gato, it’s arguably the most impressive all-in-one machine learning kit the world’s seen yet.”

OTHER THINGS I THINK ARE COOL

New York Times: Catalan Pop? Corsican Rock? It’s Europe’s Other Song Contest.. “Around 200 million people will tune into the Eurovision Song Contest on Saturday to hear music from around the continent. The 25 pop stars who will compete in the final include those performing in Italian, Spanish and Ukrainian. Yet the millions of people in Europe who speak one of its many regional and minority languages are unlikely to find themselves represented on the Eurovision stage, let alone in their country’s pop charts. Since 2002, Liet International has been offering a platform to musicians from these communities — though it is a world away from the showy spectacle of a Eurovision final.” Good morning, Internet…

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May 15, 2022 at 05:46PM
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Saturday, May 14, 2022

Southern Appalachian Archives, Fold3, Google I/0, More: Saturday ResearchBuzz, May 14, 2022

Southern Appalachian Archives, Fold3, Google I/0, More: Saturday ResearchBuzz, May 14, 2022
By ResearchBuzz

NEW RESOURCES

Western Carolina University: WCU, UNCA partnership leads to new digital Southern Appalachian archive. “The new site showcases multiple collections, particularly photographic collections of mountain vistas, intimate portraits of families and individuals, glimpses into the daily life of residents and Cherokee crafts and traditions. Additionally, oral history collections allow visitors to connect on a personal level, whether it be listening to interviews with local drag queens or reminiscing about building the Fontana Dam during World War II.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

Fold3: Introducing the New Fold3® Gallery and Tags!. “We’ve launched a beta version of a new Fold3® Gallery and Tag experience! The new Gallery and Tag feature gives researchers a powerful new tool to organize Fold3 records, Memorials, photographs, and documents. Now you can create custom tags that allow you to tag records and organize them into groups that can be quickly recalled.”

Chrome Unboxed: Google Search advancements take center stage at Google I/O. “There were so many product announcements yesterday at Google I/O that one would be forgiven to think it was a hardware event instead of the software-focused developer conference that it actually is. However, one of the areas that Google chose to spend quite a bit of time on was Search and how far it’s come during the past year.”

Engadget: Netflix is developing livestreaming features. “Deadline suggests the streaming giant could use the technology to hold live voting for competitive shows like the upcoming Dance 100 and air sets from its annual Netflix Is A Joke festival, among other use cases. The feature doesn’t have a rollout date yet, with only a small team within the company reportedly in the ‘preliminary’ stages of developing the tech.”

AROUND THE INTERNET WORLD

Stars and Stripes: Detailed ‘open source’ news investigations are catching on. “One of the more striking pieces of journalism from the Ukraine war featured intercepted radio transmissions from Russian soldiers indicating an invasion in disarray, their conversations even interrupted by a hacker literally whistling ‘Dixie.’ It was the work of an investigations unit at The New York Times that specializes in open-source reporting, using publicly available material like satellite images, mobile phone or security camera recordings, geolocation and other internet tools to tell stories.”

Mashable: New online campaign reminds us that street harassment isn’t a rite of passage. It’s a public health concern.. “[Candice] Cho’s story is just one representation of a diverse array of tales shared through the #SaferPlace social media campaign, a new effort by advocates to document the frequent harassment that women, people of color, and LGBT and gender nonconforming people face in public spaces. As May is Asian and Pacific Islander (API) Heritage Month, the social media effort adds a sense of heightened, nuanced awareness of the intersectional public safety issues faced by members of these diverse communities.”

BuzzFeed News: Autistic People Are Using TikTok To Connect And Advocate For Neurodivergent Communities. “Autistic people didn’t always have a platform or readily available community. Now, they’re using TikTok to make connections and teach others about neurodiverse communities.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

Federal News Network: Spy agencies look to standardize use of open source intelligence. “Intelligence agencies are starting to coalesce around a set of common standards and data for using open source intelligence, but challenges remain in boosting the use of OSINT throughout the intelligence community.”

Krebs On Security: DEA Investigating Breach of Law Enforcement Data Portal. “The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) says it is investigating reports that hackers gained unauthorized access to an agency portal that taps into 16 different federal law enforcement databases. KrebsOnSecurity has learned the alleged compromise is tied to a cybercrime and online harassment community that routinely impersonates police and government officials to harvest personal information on their targets.”

Washington Post: The next book ban: States aim to limit titles students can search for. “Republican lawmakers across the country are proposing legislation that would target online library databases and library management technology — tools built by a half-dozen large companies that catalogue millions of books, journals and articles that students peruse for assignments.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

University of Melbourne: The Hidden Stories In Australia’s Cultural Data. “The widespread digitisation of art and culture means data science is now being used to reveal fresh cultural stories and connections that would otherwise have been impossible to uncover. Researchers are detecting surprising trends, telling the micro-biographical histories of artists and asking new questions about the connection between the environment, the economy, and Australia’s arts and cultural life.”

The Ohio State University: The deadly impact of urban streets that look like highways. “Serious auto crashes in urban areas are more likely on city streets that look to drivers like highways, new research suggests. The study used a novel approach: Ohio State University researchers applied machine learning techniques to analyze more than 240,000 images of road segments in Columbus, Ohio, taken from Google Street View. The goal was to see what the roads looked like to drivers and whether that was linked to serious and deadly crashes.” Good afternoon, Internet…

May 15, 2022 at 12:09AM
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Asia Disinformation Efforts, Exiled Activists, Information War Failures, More: Ukraine Update, May 14, 2022

Asia Disinformation Efforts, Exiled Activists, Information War Failures, More: Ukraine Update, May 14, 2022
By ResearchBuzz

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

CNN: US intelligence community launches review following Ukraine and Afghanistan intel failings. “The US intelligence community is carrying out a sweeping internal review of how it assesses the fighting power of foreign militaries amid mounting pressure from key lawmakers on Capitol Hill who say officials have failed twice in one year on the two major foreign policy crises faced by the Biden administration in Ukraine and Afghanistan.”

AROUND THE INTERNET WORLD

Meaww: Who was Petro Dziuba? Russia uses UKRAINIAN pilot on propaganda poster after bombing cemetery where he’s buried. “A Russian poster celebrating Victory Day on Monday, May 9, reportedly depicted a Ukrainian pilot from the Soviet era who shot down 16 German planes in World War II. The photos made the rounds on social media and sparked outrage amid claims that Russia had bombed the Kharkiv cemetery where airman Petro Dzubia was buried.”

StopFake: Russia-Ukraine War through the Prism of Mass Communications. “Ukraine’s struggle for independence from Russia has become truly global from the perspective of mass communications. This war is universally covered in the world media. It is extremely visible. It is a war that demands the expression of public judgment, thus becoming a point of political identification. The current confrontation between Russian and Ukrainian media discourses is not an ordinary clash of warring parties propaganda rhetoric. In this war, Western civilization is searching for an answer to a question of utmost importance: can it withstand within its own value framework – or is it no longer able to do so.”

Fulcrum: The Russia-Ukraine War: Unpacking Online Pro-Russia Narratives in Vietnam. “Pro-Russia narratives in Vietnam’s cyberspace are the result of cross-pollination between sentimental attachment since the Soviet era, psychological bias towards Russia embedded in Vietnam’s education and propaganda system, and the overriding imperative to preserve the Vietnamese state’s political and ideological interests.”

The Guardian: China’s pro-Russia propaganda exposed by online activists. “A number of Chinese government-linked media outlets and pro-Russia social media accounts are spreading pro-Kremlin sentiment on the Chinese internet by mistranslating or manipulating international news about the war in Ukraine.”

Waging Nonviolence: ‘Poison for the people’ — How an exiled activist is countering Russia’s propaganda machine. “Environmental activist Evgeniya Chirikova once helped save a forest in Moscow. Now she’s trying to give voice to Russian activists and journalists resisting Putin’s regime.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

BBC: Ukraine war: The stolen faces used to promote Vladimir Putin. “Indian influencer ER Yamini has never tweeted in her life – she prefers to cultivate her big fan bases on Instagram and YouTube. But in early March, a Twitter account using her picture tweeted: ‘#IStandWithPutin. True Friendship’ accompanied by a video showing two men hugging – one representing India, the other, Russia. Yamini says she doesn’t support either country in the Russia-Ukraine war, and worries about her fans.”

Bleeping Computer: Google Chrome updates failing on Android devices in Russia. “A growing number of Android Google Chrome users in Russia are reporting errors when attempting to install the latest update for the web browser. The number of complaints is increasing every day but so far, the cause of the problem remains unknown and is still unsolved.”

Bleeping Computer: Dell, Apple, Netflix face lawsuits for pulling services out of Russia. “A Moscow Arbitration Court has reportedly seized almost $11 million belonging to Dell LLC after the company failed to provide paid-for services to a local system integrator. IT systems integrator Talmer sued Dell early last month when the American computer giant declined to provide technical support services for VMware as previously agreed. Dell is the representative of VMware in Russia and was reselling these services until March 1, 2022.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

USC Center on Public Diplomacy: Why Russia Is Losing The Information War . “Given Russia’s apparent preeminence in information warfare, taking control of Ukraine seemed well within the Kremlin’s grasp. This year, as its troops massed along the Russia-Ukraine border, Russia’s information attacks were relentless, claiming that Ukraine was riddled with corruption, was run by Nazis, and was not really a nation. Once again, with this messaging as a foundation, Russia rolled into Ukraine. Despite its past successes, Russia’s information strategy did not work this time. The reason, in a word: pushback.”

Small Wars Journal: Are We Informationally Disadvantaged? The Realities of Information War in Ukraine. “Since the first mention of information advantage in the Joint Concept for Operations in the Information Environment in 2018, the Army struggled to understand what achieving information advantage really means. Much of the Army’s focus is on network degradation, systems, processes, and formations, which claim to all ensure information advantage. These discussions fail to comprehend the activities taking place in Ukraine and their implications. In essence information advantage isn’t about a unit, a computer, or even a doctrine; it’s all about the narrative. The narrative is the backbone of any information advantage, and its why Ukraine dominates Russia in the information environment currently.” This is excellent.

Brookings Institution: Putin’s internet plan: Dependency with a veneer of sovereignty. “Cut off from Western technology suppliers, Russia is moving to build an increasingly autarkic economy. Last month, Russian President Vladimir Putin created a new commission on internet and technological ‘sovereignty’ in Russia and placed Dmitry Medvedev, former president and current deputy chairman of the Security Council, as its head. According to The Moscow Times, the goal of this commission is to find substitutes for the critical IT supplies the Russian economy desperately needs. In short, Moscow is leaning into techno-isolationism more than ever before.”

May 14, 2022 at 10:54PM
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Friday, May 13, 2022

Sanctions Search, Video Forensics, Free Language Courses for Ukranians, More: Ukraine Update, May 13, 2022

Sanctions Search, Video Forensics, Free Language Courses for Ukranians, More: Ukraine Update, May 13, 2022
By ResearchBuzz

NEW RESOURCES

Baltic Times: Freely available sanctions screening tool for international businesses was launched. “Updated daily, the consolidated database of key sanctions lists… includes items subject to sanctions by the United States, the United Nations, the European Union and the United Kingdom. It is a fuzzy search engine for finding entities on the financial sanctions lists, even if there are mistakes, omissions or swapped words in the search box. The number of queries for screening on this platform is unlimited, and answers are provided within seconds.”

Washington Post: Database of 231 videos exposes the horrors of war in Ukraine. “Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is one of the most documented wars ever. Citizens, public officials and soldiers have posted videos every day that show the dead bodies in neighborhoods, the trails of missiles streaking through the skies and the smoldering ruins of entire towns. The Washington Post’s visual forensics team started to verify and catalogue videos from the war the day Russia’s invasion began. This work is now searchable in a database that will be updated. The videos have been uploaded in raw format; graphic content is clearly marked.”

Babbel: Babbel Launches Free Language Courses For Ukrainians On Its Platform. “Created with Babbel’s high quality standards, the courses offer native Ukrainian speakers the opportunity to learn German, Polish or English for free with Babbel’s award-winning app. The content is suitable for all learners, from beginner to intermediate, and available free of charge, making the community’s transition to Germany, Poland and other host countries easier.”

Institute for the Study of War: Russian General Officer Guide – May 11. “This is a guide to the current command structure of the Russian Armed Forces at the General Staff, Military District, and Army/Corps levels. It includes key officers in the Russian General Staff and identifies the commander, chief of staff, and deputy commander for Russia’s four main military districts and their subordinate army and corps-level formations. The current officers occupying each of those roles are included, as well as their biography and verifiable career history. This document is not exhaustive, and ISW will update it over time—both to fill information gaps and to expand its coverage to other key structures in the Russian military.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

The Guardian: ‘Paranoid dictator’: Russian journalists fill pro-Kremlin site with anti-war articles. “Two Russian journalists working for a popular pro-Kremlin website filled it with anti-war articles on Monday morning in a rare act of dissent as the country celebrated the Soviet Union’s victory over Nazi Germany.”

Daily Beast: Russia’s Propaganda Textbooks Go Up in Flames in Spate of Mystery Fires. “Anti-Ukrainian textbooks published by an educational company with ties to Vladimir Putin went up in flames early Tuesday, as a warehouse on the outskirts of Moscow became the latest site destroyed amid a spate of mysterious fires in the country.”

AROUND THE INTERNET WORLD

Rest of World: As grisly images spread from Ukraine, open-source researchers ask what’s too gory to share . “With the rise of Telegram, graphic imagery has proliferated in the world of open-source intelligence. Does it serve a purpose?”

The Daily Bruin: In Memoriam: Yandex delivery robots, gone but not yet forgotten. “They came on a Wednesday, and they came in peace. Nov. 17, 2021, marked the introduction of Yandex food delivery robots to the University of Arizona campus. They were an instant cultural phenomenon.”

Breaking News IE: Artist attempting to display portrait of Putin filled with Ukrainian blood in Moscow. “Russian artist Andrei Molodkin has created a portrait of Russian president Vladimir Putin filled with Ukrainian blood in a protest against the invasion of Ukraine, he spoke to BreakingNews.ie about his hope to have it displayed in Moscow. While some may find this gruesome, Mr Molodkin, a former soldier in the Soviet Army, believes art and culture play a key role in taking a stand against regimes that promote war and violence.”

WIRED: How Starlink Scrambled to Keep Ukraine Online. “The speedy, widespread rollout of Starlink in Ukraine has also been an unplanned experiment in the potential geopolitical power of next-gen satellite internet services. If SpaceX or similar providers are willing, high-speed internet from the sky could be a powerful way to provide connectivity to people or populations suffering the privations of war or authoritarian government.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

The Daily Swig: RuTube hack: Russian video platform denies loss of source code following cyber-attack . “Russian video streaming service RuTube has denied the complete loss of its source code after a cyber-attack timed to coincide with Russia’s ‘Victory Day’ brought the site down this week.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

CEPA: How to Terminate Russian Disinformation . “Proactive allied measures, including comprehensive sanctions and restrictions, have weakened the Russian disinformation machine. Western and partner governments and the private sector need to ban all key Russian accounts from major digital and media platforms. The Russian government has banned its citizens from consuming Western-based social media platforms. At the same time, that government continues to use the same platforms that it denies its own people to justify its invasion of Ukraine and position itself as a legitimate partner in democratic discussion.”

May 13, 2022 at 06:53PM
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College Overlook, Migrant Worker Stories, Toad Sex Errors, More: Friday ResearchBuzz, May 13, 2022

College Overlook, Migrant Worker Stories, Toad Sex Errors, More: Friday ResearchBuzz, May 13, 2022
By ResearchBuzz

NEW RESOURCES

PR Newswire: College Overlook Puts College Research on the Map (PRESS RELEASE). “College Overlook gives prospective college students an interactive map to locate and explore hundreds of colleges and visualize their selections. Users can filter colleges by significant criteria, can search for a specific college with a few keystrokes, or can zoom and pan the map for inspiration. Selecting up to 40 favorites, users save custom maps for later viewing or to share via personalized links on social media, to family members, or to advisors.”

The Conversation: Migrant workers are flipping the script and using Photovoice to tell their own stories . “COVID-19 and worries about food security have resulted in increased media coverage about migrant agricultural workers, with stories usually told on their behalf. Four sets of South Asian migrant men in Greece wanted to flip the script and tell their own stories. They used Photovoice, an arts-based social justice tool, to present themselves and their concerns directly to people. This eventually transformed into a travelling multi-media exhibition and a digital archive, This is Evidence.”

NewScientist: Evidence finally collated of toads mating with things they shouldn’t. “This is a new paper in the journal Ecology by Filipe Serrano and his colleagues at the University of Sao Paolo in Brazil. No amount of science words can gloss over the fact that it amounts to a spreadsheet of all the instances recorded in the scientific literature in the past century of frogs attempting to mate with things that they shouldn’t.”

Grit Daily: New Database Lists 1,100+ Suppliers of Recycled Paper and Next Gen Paper, Packaging Products. “The EcoPaper Database (EPD), created by international environmental non-profit Canopy, is a listing of over 1,100 paper and paper packaging options available to help businesses reduce their impact on Ancient and Endangered Forests.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

CNN: Elon Musk says his deal to buy Twitter is on hold. “Elon Musk said he is putting his bid to acquire Twitter (TWTR) on hold, weeks after agreeing to take the company private in a $44 billion deal.”

The Verge: Google is using a new way to measure skin tones to make search results more inclusive. “The tech giant is working with Ellis Monk, an assistant professor of sociology at Harvard and the creator of the Monk Skin Tone Scale, or MST. The MST Scale is designed to replace outdated skin tone scales that are biased towards lighter skin. When these older scales are used by tech companies to categorize skin color, it can lead to products that perform worse for people with darker coloring, says Monk.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

BNN Bloomberg: DOJ Loses Bid to Sanction Google for Withholding Documents. “Alphabet Inc.’s Google dodged court sanctions after it was called out by the Justice Department for hiding documents from government lawyers. U.S. District Judge Amit Mehta in Washington said during a hearing Thursday that he wouldn’t punish the company over its practice of having employees copy company lawyers on emails when discussing competition issues.”

Bleeping Computer: Microsoft May 2022 Patch Tuesday fixes 3 zero-days, 75 flaws. “Today is Microsoft’s May 2022 Patch Tuesday, and with it comes fixes for three zero-day vulnerabilities, with one actively exploited, and a total of 75 flaws. Of the 75 vulnerabilities fixed in today’s update, eight are classified as ‘Critical’ as they allow remote code execution or elevation of privileges.”

Reuters: Livestreaming of federal appellate arguments may outlive pandemic, judiciary says . “Livestreaming of federal appellate court arguments could outlast the COVID-19 pandemic, the federal judiciary has told U.S. lawmakers, with all but one circuit court indicating plans to at least consider keeping the practice going.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

CBS News: Alabama shipwreck holds key to the past for descendants of enslaved Africans: “Be sure that that legacy lives on”. “Work performed this month will help answer a question residents of the area called Africatown USA are anxious to resolve: Can remnants of the slave ship Clotilda be retrieved from the water to both fill out details about their heritage and to serve as an attraction that might revitalize the place their ancestors built after emancipation?”

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette: A public database significantly undercounts former drug labs in Pa. Here’s why homebuyers and renters should care.. “The only online federal database that allows people to see whether their home or property was contaminated with toxic chemicals used to make drugs like methamphetamine significantly undercounts the number of sites in Pennsylvania, according to data obtained by Spotlight PA. Similar reporting discrepancies exist in neighboring states, but Pennsylvania is one of several nationwide that do not have laws or guidelines outlining how contaminated properties should be cleaned or when they are safe to live in, according to the Environmental Protection Agency.”

Reuters: China launches antitrust probe into academic database CNKI. “China’s market regulator said on Friday it had launched an antitrust investigation into the country’s largest online academic database, the China National Knowledge Infrastructure (CNKI).” Good morning, Internet…

May 13, 2022 at 05:25PM
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Thursday, May 12, 2022

Quotable Minnesota, Twitter Privacy, Airbnb, More: Thursday Afternoon ResearchBuzz, May 12, 2022

Quotable Minnesota, Twitter Privacy, Airbnb, More: Thursday Afternoon ResearchBuzz, May 12, 2022
By ResearchBuzz

NEW RESOURCES

Minitex: MDL Releases New Online Exhibit: Quotable Minnesota. “The Minnesota Digital Library published a new online exhibit titled ‘Quotable Minnesota.’ This exhibit features several quotes from Minnesota’s artists, authors, musicians, leaders, and more. Their inspiring words are illustrated by some of our favorite images from MDL collections.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

Gizmodo: Twitter’s New Privacy Policy Is a Video Game That Sucks. “Twitter unveiled a game designed to help users get a handle on the platform’s privacy policies on Tuesday. It’s both cheery and deeply confusing.”

Travel+Leisure: Airbnb Launches New Search Feature to Help Travelers Find Any Type of Home — From A-frame Cabins to Castles. “When users visit Airbnb, they are now presented with 56 categories that organize homes into curated collections based on their unique style, location, or proximity to travel activity.”

USEFUL STUFF

Self: How to Find Support If Social Media Is Hurting Your Mental Health . “For so many of us, scrolling through Instagram or TikTok feels as unconscious as breathing. Your phone is a powerful tool—it can transport you to any world you want it to. The interests you find joy in, whether they be fashion, music, politics, pop culture, or home decor, are more accessible than ever. So why does social media make us so damn unhappy sometimes?”

AROUND THE INTERNET WORLD

TechCrunch: Copper is building ‘the Instagram for book lovers’. “The founder and CEO of Copper, Allison Trowbridge wanted to build a social network that revolves around books, connecting authors and fans through in-app discussions and live events. As an author herself, she also wanted to help writers find new income streams, whether that’s through ticketed virtual events, or just generating enough conversation around a book that more people buy it.”

BuzzFeed News: She Was Single. She Wanted A Baby. So She Did It Herself.. “In recent years, SMBCs have formed small but rich and tight-knit online communities like the 4,000-member-strong Single Mother by Choice subreddit, where they help one another navigate the complexities of this path. Topics include how to find a sperm donor, what to say to your friends and family, whether to do insemination through a fertility clinic or the ‘DIY’ method, and how to prepare your finances for a child.”

AdWeek: Raça Magazine and FCB Brasil Launch Digital Tool to Amplify Black Voices. “According to the publication and agency, on average, people use only 33 characters when they tweet, while the platform allows for up to 280 characters. The digital tool automatically fills in the unused space with Black references and information matching the topic someone is tweeting about. The database of references is also based on 25 years of articles published on Raça Magazine.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

Mashable: Twitter shareholder Elon Musk is reportedly being investigated by the SEC. Again.. “Under the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, investors who acquire over 5 percent of a publicly traded company are required to file a report notifying the SEC within 10 days of the acquisition. Musk bought enough Twitter shares to pass this 5 percent threshold on March 14, putting the deadline for disclosure at March 24. However, rather than notifying the SEC of his shiny new Twitter stocks, Musk waited until the deadline passed before buying even more shares, putting his stake at 9.2 percent.”

ProPublica: Intuit Will Pay Millions to Customers Tricked Into Paying for TurboTax. “Millions of Americans will receive money from Intuit, the maker of TurboTax, as part of a $141 million settlement between the Silicon Valley company and all 50 states and the District of Columbia. The company will send up to $90 apiece to more than 4 million people who paid for TurboTax software even though they were eligible to receive it for free.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

University of Maryland Baltimore: New Center Brings Virtual Reality Research Into Focus. “The University of Maryland School of Medicine (UMSOM) is the joint recipient of $4.75 million in funding from the National Science Foundation (NSF) to establish a new Center for Medical Innovations in Extended Reality.” Good afternoon, Internet…

May 13, 2022 at 01:06AM
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Preserving Ukraine Cultural Heritage, Russia Disinformation Efforts, Drone Technology, More: Ukraine Update, May 12, 2022

Preserving Ukraine Cultural Heritage, Russia Disinformation Efforts, Drone Technology, More: Ukraine Update, May 12, 2022
By ResearchBuzz

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

The Mayor: Czechia helps Ukraine preserve its endangered cultural heritage. “Yesterday morning, two trucks filled with packaging, bubble wrap, polyethylene foams and other materials left the National Museum in Prague and set off to Ukraine. According to the museum, this consignment of materials was commissioned by the Czech Ministry of Culture to help Ukraine preserve its endangered cultural heritage, monuments, and artworks.”

Task & Purpose: Russia actually isn’t as good at information warfare as everyone thought. “…far from being the juggernaut of neo-Soviet disinformation that the West had expected, Russia’s information operations about the war in Ukraine have largely sucked. Just prior to the invasion, Russia claimed that a Ukrainian roadside bomb had killed three people inside separatist-held eastern Ukraine, yet the skull of one of the charred bodies that the Russians paraded in front of sympathetic media showed signs that it had undergone an autopsy procedure, meaning the person was dead before being placed at the scene of the alleged attack.”

Harper’s Bazaar: “This is how we are fighting for our country”: meet the women waging the information war for Ukraine. “The stories we tell are important. They define how we view the world around us. Often, they outlast us, and come to shape the years we have seen, the events that occurred, the lives that exist – or are lost. The stories we tell right now, about the war in Ukraine, are vital for this very reason. These are the driving force behind Dattalion, a collective established a mere three days after the Russian invasion of Ukraine, by a group of female volunteers determined to ensure that the stories of this war would be told accurately and would not – and could not – be ignored.”

AROUND THE SEARCH AND SOCIAL MEDIA WORLD

WIRED: Small Drones Are Giving Ukraine an Unprecedented Edge. “Since Vladimir Putin invaded Ukraine at the end of February, drones of all shapes and sizes have been used by both sides in the conflict. At one end of the scale are large military drones that can be used for aerial surveillance and to attack targets on the ground. In contrast, small commercial drones can be flown by people without any specific training and carried around in a suitcase-sized box. While both types of drones have been used in previous conflicts, the current scale of small, commercial drone use in Ukraine is unprecedented.”

Amnesty International UK: Russia: Schools and universities latest victims of Putin’s war propaganda machine. “Dozens of schoolteachers and university lecturers have faced harsh reprisals for speaking out against the war in Ukraine. Some have been put behind bars to serve so-called administrative arrest or have had to pay extortionate fines simply for expressing their opinions either publicly or in the classroom. Others have been dismissed or otherwise reprimanded.”

Washington Post: Sanctions forcing Russia to use appliance parts in military gear, U.S. says. “U.S.-led sanctions are forcing Russia to use computer chips from dishwashers and refrigerators in some military equipment, Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo said Wednesday.”

The Mainichi: Japanese live-streaming platform giving Ukrainian streamers new life . “Tetiana Dozhuk is one of two streamers that ‘Omusubi Channel’ has already helped to evacuate to Japan since the Russian invasion of Ukraine began in late February, with the platform also devising ways to support other Ukrainians who have fled to neighboring countries like Poland.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

The Register: Google blocks paid apps from Play Store in Russia. “Google has begun blocking downloads of paid apps and their updates in Russia as of May 5, citing compliance issues. Existing subscriptions will continue until the end of the billing cycle and free apps are not affected by the policy change. Developer payouts are also not affected.”

SecurityWeek: Google Sees More APTs Using Ukraine War-Related Themes. “Researchers at Google’s Threat Analysis Group (TAG) say the number of advanced threat actors using Ukraine war-related themes in cyberattacks went up in April with a surge in malware attacks targeting critical infrastructure.”

Ars Technica: US and its allies say Russia waged cyberattack that took out satellite network. “The US and European Union on Tuesday said Russia was responsible for a cyberattack in February that crippled a satellite network in Ukraine and neighboring countries, disrupting communications and a wind farm used to generate electricity.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

UK Government: Russian attack on Ukraine’s civilian infrastructure and cultural property: UK statement to the OSCE. “Alongside schools and hospitals, contrary to its obligations under the 1954 Hague Convention, Russia is targeting cultural property. As verified by UNESCO, 127 cultural sites have been damaged or destroyed since the start of the war. This includes the Hryhorii Skovoroda National Literacy Memorial Museum in Kharkiv region, as mentioned by my Ukrainian colleague earlier. This is not collateral damage, as some in Russia would have us believe. Russia is deliberately waging a war with no distinction between military and civilian targets, with no regard for the Ukrainian people, their history or their culture.”

Evening Standard: Russia is engaged in a campaign of cultural terrorism in Ukraine — we must fight against it. “Russia is engaged in a campaign of cultural terrorism. It might seem bizarre to bomb a quiet house of books, or crush Kharkiv’s historical tram depot, which is a bit like shelling the London Transport Museum. But Russia knows very well how important arts and culture are to a nation’s sense of itself.”

May 12, 2022 at 07:29PM
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