Nobody Cares! (Science & Tech Edition)

[Free]

He used to run an air and space museum, and was a Navy pilot, so he's not totally unqualified. The first "A" in NASA is "Aeronautics". But more pertinent to his job, he's a former congressman, and the main job of a NASA Administrator is to get funding from Congress.

Joke - Wikipedia

 

[Dakota Tebaldi]

The MiSafes Kid Watcher Plus is a "smartwatch" which allows frantic helicopter parents the opportunity to track their child's every movement and location history via GPS; it also uses geofencing to send alerts to parent whenever a child ventures outside of a pre-defined "safe area", allows parents (or any other party added to the whitelist) to initiate two-way phone calls with their child via the watch, and allows parents to invisibly activate the watch's microphone so they can listen to what their kid is up to in real-time whenever they want.

Privacy and trust issues aside, obviously the stated point of a device like this is to help parents keep their kids safe, to an extent that gives them (the parents) some peace of mind. Naturally, of course, the watch is hackable AF via the internet, because of course it is.

A security researcher found the devices neither encrypted the data they used nor secured each child's account.

As a result, he said, he could track children's movements, surreptitiously listen in to their activities and make spoof calls to the watches that appeared to be from parents.

Experts say the issues are so severe that the product should be discarded.

Both the BBC and the researcher involved tried to contact the makers of the MiSafes Kid's Watcher Plus to alert them to the problem but received no reply.

Likewise, a China-based company listed as the product's supplier did not respond to requests.



The Norwegian Consumer Council highlighted other cases of child-targeted smartwatches with security flaws last year .

It said the MiSafes products appeared to be "even more problematic" than the examples it had flagged.

"This is another example of unsecure products that should never have reached the market," said Gro Mette Moen, the watchdog's acting director of digital services.

"Our advice is to refrain from buying these smartwatches until the sellers can prove that their features and security standards are satisfactory."

In the UK, Amazon used to sell the watches but has not had stock for some time.

The BBC found three listings for the watches on eBay earlier this week but the online marketplace said it had since removed them on the grounds of an existing ban on equipment that could be used to spy on people's activities without their knowledge.

"We don't allow the sale of these products on our marketplace," said a spokeswoman.

MiSafes previously made headlines in February when an Austrian cyber-security company discovered several flaws with its Mi-Cam baby monitors .

SEC Consult said these meant hackers could spy on footage from owners' homes and hijack accounts.

It too was unable to get a response from the manufacturer.

 

[Essence Lumin]

I have a friend who has almost no money. She wants to buy a computer on credit. She found wards.com aka Montgomery Wards. Didn't they use to be a company like Sears? Now they seem to be a company that preys on people with no cash or credit. She sent me several links to computers there. They are all priced at least twice the price of what they are worth. Some Celeron thing with a vga plug for $600 and the like. Sad.

 

[Free]

I have a friend who has almost no money. She wants to buy a computer on credit. She found wards.com aka Montgomery Wards. Didn't they use to be a company like Sears? Now they seem to be a company that preys on people with no cash or credit.

I would never buy a pc on credit. Penny pinch, save, and keep saving, and save a little longer until you have what you need for the system you want. I've gone through the process several times over the years. Having to sit on your hands while waiting until you have enough has almost killed me once or twice, but I prefer it to the extra costs buying on credit can eek from you.

However, nowadays there are other, smarter options. For example, if your friend likes MS Surface devices: Surface All Access - Computer and Laptop Payment Plans - Microsoft

 

[Pamela]

Face off: Realistic masks made in Japan find demand from tech, car companies

These are amazing. I think of the possibilities for all those whose faces have been destroyed.

 

[Katheryne Helendale]

I have a friend who has almost no money. She wants to buy a computer on credit. She found wards.com aka Montgomery Wards. Didn't they use to be a company like Sears? Now they seem to be a company that preys on people with no cash or credit. She sent me several links to computers there. They are all priced at least twice the price of what they are worth. Some Celeron thing with a vga plug for $600 and the like. Sad.

Looks like they've gone the way of Aaron's, or Rent-to-Own. Grossly-overpriced mediocre merchandise where they tell you it's "only" $40 a month, but don't tell you how many months you'd be paying on it. It's a shame. I used to shop at Montgomery Wards back when they were one of the big department stores, along with Sears and JCPenney. They were a pretty good deal, as long as you stayed away from their store charge card.

 

[danielravennest]

I have a friend who has almost no money. She wants to buy a computer on credit. She found wards.com aka Montgomery Wards. Didn't they use to be a company like Sears? Now they seem to be a company that preys on people with no cash or credit. She sent me several links to computers there. They are all priced at least twice the price of what they are worth. Some Celeron thing with a vga plug for $600 and the like. Sad.

The original Montgomery Wards went bankrupt in 2000, killed by the likes of Target and Walmart. A direct marketer bought the name in 2004, but it is a distinct company that has no stores. Depending on what your friend's needs are, you can get a perfectly adequate computer for almost nothing these days second-hand. I gave away my 3rd oldest PC when I bought the one I'm using now (the second oldest became the backup to store files). Reputable computer repair shops are a good place to look for second-hand ones. If she wants "nearly new" or "new", someplace like MicroCenter has better deals. Refurbs and Open Box units are "nearly new"

 

[Free]

The International Space Station is full of floppy disks

 

[danielravennest]

The International Space Station is full of floppy disks

What a young person says: "Look, they 3-D printed the disk icon"

 

[Ashiri]

Joke - Wikipedia

Perhaps you need to label your joke posts as such.

 

[Free]

Perhaps you need to label your joke posts as such.

I tried that once. Didn't help.

 

[danielravennest]

The InSight Mars lander is due to reach the planet tomorrow afternoon. Like Curiosity before it, there will be a "Seven Minutes of Terror", where the automated landing has to work perfectly, but the mission people at JPL can do nothing about it. That's because the light travel time from Mars is 8 minutes, and it will all be over before they even know the sequence has started.

You can track how far it is from Mars on the Roadster website (which is also tracking Musk's car), and I'm sure JPL will have a live feed when it gets close.

Mission Timeline

 

[Dakota Tebaldi]

Landed! \o/

 

[Dakota Tebaldi]

 

[Veritable Quandry]

Had to check to see if that was Elon Musk posting.

 

[Kalel]

A Mystery Seismic Wave Just Swept Earth—but Scientists Can't Work Out Why

Scientists are at a loss to explain a strange seismic event that shook the planet on November 11 and was picked up by earthquake sensors stationed across the globe.

While the cause of this mysterious disturbance remains unknown, it's somehow linked to an ongoing seismic swarm that's been rumbling the archipelago of Mayotte in the Indian Ocean for several months – but just what these unusual tremors ultimately signify remains unclear.

"I don't think I've seen anything like it," seismologist Göran Ekström from Columbia University told National Geographic about the November 11 anomaly.

A Mystery Seismic Wave Just Swept Earth—but Scientists Can't Work Out Why Follow us: @GeologyTime on Twitter
.

 

[Soen Eber]

A Mystery Seismic Wave Just Swept Earth—but Scientists Can't Work Out Why

I'm too lazy to link, but ten minutes of Google searching shows the area is a volcanic hot spot. Long time past, a blow torch effect from the mantle separated Madagascar from India, and delaminated the lithosphere under North Madagascar (causing it to sink) and the north part of the island bounced up a kilometer because there was nothing holding it down. Maybe the lithosphere finally hit bottom?

 

[danielravennest]

A Mystery Seismic Wave Just Swept Earth—but Scientists Can't Work Out Why

Kaiju!

 

[Free]

 

[Free]

A computer...on my desk?