ReHacked vol. 340: F-Droid and Google's Developer Registration Decree, Personal data storage is an idea whose time has come and more
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Open Source Android Repository F-Droid Says Google's New Rules Will Shut It Down - Slashdot #software #google
F-Droid has warned that Google's upcoming developer verification program will kill the free and open source app repository. Google announced plans several weeks ago to force all Android app developers to register their apps and identity with the company. Apps not validated by Google will not be installable on certified Android devices.
F-Droid says it cannot require developers to register with Google or take over app identifiers to register for them. The site operators say doing so would effectively take over distribution rights from app authors. Google plans to begin testing the verification scheme in the coming weeks and may charge registration fees. Unverified apps will start being blocked next year in Brazil, Indonesia, Singapore, and Thailand before expanding globally in 2027. F-Droid is calling on US and EU regulators to intervene.
F-Droid and Google's Developer Registration Decree | F-Droid - Free and Open Source Android App Repository #software #google
Regulatory and competition authorities should look carefully at Google’s proposed activities, and ensure that policies designed to improve security are not abused to consolidate monopoly control. We urge regulators to safeguard the ability of alternative app stores and open-source projects to operate freely, and to protect developers who cannot or will not comply with exclusionary registration schemes and demands for personal information.
If you are a developer or user who values digital freedom, you can help. Write to your Member of Parliament, Congressperson or other representative, sign petitions in defense of sideloading and software freedom, and contact the European Commission’s Digital Markets Act (DMA) team to express why preserving open distribution matters. By making your voice heard, you help defend not only F-Droid, but the principle that software should remain a commons, accessible and free from unnecessary corporate gatekeeping.
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Personal data storage is an idea whose time has come #internet
Back in 2009 Tim Berners-Lee drafted a web-specification for "Socially Aware Cloud Storage":
There is an architecture in which a few existing or Web protocols are gathered together with some glue to make a world wide system in which applications (desktop or web application) can work on top of a layer of commodity read-write storage.
Crucial design issues are that principals (users) and groups are identifies by URIs, and so are global in scope, and that elements of storage are access controlled using those global identifiers. The result is that storage becomes a commodity, independent of the application running on it.
MEPs: EU must explain funding to spyware companies • The Register #privacy #politics According to FTM, EU science research program Horizon 2020 awarded €1.74 million (c $2 million) to projects that involved Innova, which supplied surveillance tools to Italian prosecutors' offices.
The European Regional Development Fund and the European Social Fund also funded Innova around €41,350, and the former additionally doled out around three-quarters of the money for a project run by Movia between 2019-2021, a company that develops the Spider spyware.
Various other EU programs have contributed funds to other spyware companies, such as Area, Memento Labs (formerly Hacking Team), and Negg Group, FTM claimed.
Perhaps most controversially, the European Commission awarded a €60,000 (c $70,500) contract to France-based Nexa Technologies in 2015.
At the time, Nexa was part of the Intellexa Alliance of spyware companies, which in turn was linked to the Intellexa Consortium, which was previously sanctioned by the US for its involvement in the infamous Predator spyware.
Red Hat confirms security incident after hackers breach GitLab instance #security
Red Hat emphasized that the GitLab instance is only used by its consulting division and the breach does not impact other Red Hat products or its supply chain, including software downloaded from official channels.
The company confirmed that the instance contained consulting engagement reports (CERs), which may include project specifications, example code snippets, and internal communications related to consulting services. However, Red Hat states that these reports typically do not contain personal information, and none have been found during the investigation.
The company is now contacting impacted customers to share further information on what may have been exposed.
Separately, GitLab informed BleepingComputer that its platform or accounts were not compromised, emphasizing that the incident only affected Red Hat's self-managed instance of GitLab Community Edition and that customers are responsible for securing these installations.
Being organised and active may be predictor of longer life, study finds | Psychology | The Guardian #health
Being organised, active and helpful could not just make you a better person, it may even help you live longer. On the other hand, being frequently stressed, anxious or moody could be linked to a shorter lifespan.
Researchers said their findings, published in the Journal of Psychosomatic Research, could help doctors develop tools for predicting health risks based not only on blood pressure and cholesterol but also on how someone tends to think, feel and behave.
René Mõttus, a psychologist and co-author of the study, said: “Rather than looking at broad, catch-all personality types like extroverted or conscientious, we zoomed in on individual descriptors: the precise ways people talked about themselves when filling out standardised personality questionnaires.”
EUPL [European Union Public Licence] #copytights
The main objective of the European Commission is to distribute widely and promote the use of software owned by itself and other European Institutions under an Free/Open Source Licence conform to European law requirements.
The EUPL is however written in neutral terms so that a broader use might be envisaged.
In addition, distribution of software should avoid the exclusive appropriation of the software even after improvement by a third party (therefore, the EUPL is a "copyleft" licence).
Image site Imgur pulls out of UK as data watchdog threatens fine | UK | News | Express.co.uk #copyrights #internet #privacy
An image hosting platform with more than 130 million users has stopped being available in the UK after regulators signalled their intention to impose penalties over concerns around children’s data.
The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) said that it has reached provisional findings in an investigation in the parent company of image hosting site, Imgur. Its probe was launched earlier this year, as part of the regulator's Children’s Code strategy, which is intended to set the standards for how online services handle the personal information of young people.
The radioactive 'miracle water' that killed its believers | Popular Science #history
William Bailey promised to cure anything that ailed you. “Just a tiny bottle of apparently lifeless, colorless, and tasteless water” was, he advertised in a 1929 pamphlet for his product, Radithor, “the greatest therapeutic force known to mankind.” A few sips several times a day would treat acne, anemia, arthritis, alcoholism, and asthma. And that was just a few of the “A” conditions Bailey pledged his potion would “ameliorate to a considerable degree.” Between 1924 and 1930, that list would grow to include more than 150 diseases and discomforts. The life-threatening (heart disease, leukemia), embarrassing (impotence, flatulence), and annoying (poison ivy, wrinkles) could all be remedied with Radithor’s main ingredient, “internal sunshine”—that is, highly radioactive radium isotopes.
Google to merge Android and ChromeOS in 2026, because AI • The Register #software
Google has confirmed it will merge its ChromeOS and Android operating systems, and that the mobile OS will emerge triumphant.
The ads and search giant has hinted that the two operating systems would merge. On Wednesday at Qualcomm’s Summit event, Google’s president for the Android ecosystem, Sameer Samat, made it official. Android will be the winner and users will see the results in 2026.
Vertical Solar Panels Are Out Standing | Hackaday #hack #solar #renewables
If you’re mounting solar panels, everybody knows the drill, right? Point them south, angled according to latitude. It’s easy. In a video which demonstrates that [Everyday Dave] is truly out standing in his field, we hear a different story. [Dave] has a year’s worth of data in his Solar Panel Showdown that suggests there are good reasons to mount your panels vertically.
Write the damn code #software #vibecoding #ai
- Ask AI for an initial version and then refactor it to match your expectations.
- Write the initial version yourself and ask AI to review and improve it.
- Write the critical parts and ask AI to do the rest.
- Write an outline of the code and ask AI to fill the missing parts.
What the law does:
SB 53 establishes new requirements for frontier AI developers creating stronger:
✅ Transparency: Requires large frontier developers to publicly publish a framework on its website describing how the company has incorporated national standards, international standards, and industry-consensus best practices into its frontier AI framework.
✅ Innovation: Establishes a new consortium within the Government Operations Agency to develop a framework for creating a public computing cluster. The consortium, called CalCompute, will advance the development and deployment of artificial intelligence that is safe, ethical, equitable, and sustainable by fostering research and innovation.
✅ Safety: Creates a new mechanism for frontier AI companies and the public to report potential critical safety incidents to California’s Office of Emergency Services.
✅ Accountability: Protects whistleblowers who disclose significant health and safety risks posed by frontier models, and creates a civil penalty for noncompliance, enforceable by the Attorney General’s office.
✅ Responsiveness: Directs the California Department of Technology to annually recommend appropriate updates to the law based on multistakeholder input, technological developments, and international standards.
Untold history: New book reveals tales from the first airship voyage around the world | Euronews #history
The trip was a success: the LZ 127 Graf Zeppelin departed from Friedrichshafen towards Tokyo, where it made a stopover after flying over the Soviet Union. It crossed the Pacific Ocean to Los Angeles for a second stopover and flew over the United States to Lakehurst, on the east coast.
After crossing the Atlantic Ocean, the airship returned triumphantly to Germany on 4 September 1929, a journey that lasted 20 days, 4 hours and 14 minutes.
Now, cartographer and science writer Alejandro Polanco has revisited the historic event in an illustrated book: ‘The first flight around the world in the Graf Zeppelin’.
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