Stephanie Ross posted: " Once infected with the COVID-19, your body forms antibodies that could prevent you from being reinfected. However, that doesn't necessarily mean you'll never contract the virus again. There are a lot of factors where a person can get infected with the" Market Business News
Once infected with the COVID-19, your body forms antibodies that could prevent you from being reinfected. However, that doesn't necessarily mean you'll never contract the virus again. There are a lot of factors where a person can get infected with the virus.
We'll never be completely safe until there's a dedicated "medicine" to treat COVID-19. So, for now, here are the universal ways to stay safe from, recover from, and prevent reinfection with COVID-19.
Stay Home and Recuperate
A person's immune system takes several days to clear the COVID-19 virus from the body. Its symptoms may go away more or less in a week, but you could still be contagious for days after.
Stay home first to limit exposing others. Gone are those days when you'll be reprimanded for not coming to school or company. Instead, notify them that you got positive and have to recover first for some time. They'll surely be glad if you do so.
Don't get too lenient at home still. You know the drill. Religiously wash your hands with soap and water. Disinfect high-touch surfaces too. You can still talk to others but wear a mask and keep a distance between you and them. It's hard, but it will be harder if you infect them.
It's best if you isolate yourself and get more sleep instead. Having enough rest boosts your immune system, which can help you recover faster and avoid getting sick in the first place. A regular 8-hour sleep every night has always been recommended for optimal health.
Lastly, be medically alert if you're a person or around people with comorbidities. For example, people with cerebrovascular diseases like stroke will likely get very sick from COVID-19. They're usually hypertensive, so when they're unwell, their blood pressure spikes too, leading to another stroke. Always stay in contact with your primary care provider.
Get Vaccinated
You have the right to say no to vaccines. However, the COVID-19 pandemic is a global crisis. We are all in this together, so we have to be responsible for keeping everyone safe. During this pandemic, herd immunity is in everyone's best interest.
In addition to that, it's a preventive measure against reinfection. In fact, a recent study showed that the unvaccinated are more likely to get reinfected with COVID-19 than those who got their jabs after recovering.
How each immune system responds to COVID-19 is still not yet clear-cut. We still know very little about it. What's evident nowadays is a strong protection that vaccine-induced immunity gives.
Be Insured
A study reported that 1 out of 10 US citizens under age 65 don't have health insurance, an unexpected situation from a very advanced industrialized America. Although survey findings showed a decrease in the uninsured rate, the difference was insignificant.
The COVID-19 pandemic had taught America, at its worst situation, that this enormous health coverage gap will not only endanger the people's health and economic security. It also puts the entire state at risk, affecting its people even more.
Health insurance isn't only seen as security. It can also affect your health outcomes. When you're insured, you'll likely engage in regular medical care. As a result, unforeseen conditions can be diagnosed, treated, and prevented. One study even indicated that insured people would be 17% likely to avoid a cardiac arrest. It could be a matter of life and death.
If you're still among those millions of uninsured people, start including insurance IQ health insurance within your budget. Healthcare is expensive, but it becomes far more reasonable with insurance.
Keep Fit and Healthy
Staying fit doesn't have to be outdoors or with equipment. Yoga, in particular, can easily be done anytime, anywhere. It promotes physical and emotional health, so it's a must-try during your post-recovery. Also, it's totally safe for sick people since it only involves gentle motions.
You don't have to get a yoga mat or expensive subscriptions just to be able to pull it off. Just staying in bed and doing simple poses like legs up the wall or a seated forward bend can already encourage mindfulness and relieve muscle soreness from staying in bed all day.
Lastly, proper nutrition and hydration are important for your recovery. Due to the increased stress from COVID-19, consume more calories than your normal intake. But make sure to opt for nutrient-dense whole foods. Also, for every 15 minutes, drink 2-4 ounces of fluids, especially those drinks with calories and protein, sports drinks, or oral rehydration solutions.
Takeaway
Getting back to your old self or even being better is no easy task. It takes some time. Once you're on the mend, stay patient with your body. Always pay attention to the way your body feels. The last thing you want to do is overexert yourself and get sick again. With a healthy mindset and routine, you'll be back to your healthy self in no time.
Christina Macpherson posted: " https://www.nuclearpolicy.info/news/new-energy-security-bill-waters-down-regulation-for-fusion-warns-nfla/ As the Nuclear Free Local Authorities have feared, following a pre-Christmas BEIS consultation, the Johnson Government has recently reveal" nuclear-news
As the Nuclear Free Local Authorities have feared, following a pre-Christmas BEIS consultation, the Johnson Government has recently revealed its plans to relax the regulatory regime applicable to future fusion reactors by choosing not to classify them as 'nuclear installations'.
Fission nuclear reactors are subject to nuclear site licencing requirements overseen by the Office of Nuclear Regulation under the Nuclear Installations Act 1965 (NIA 1965), but government ministers have now decided that fusion plants should instead be regulated by the Health and Safety Executive and Environment Agency like other industrial facilities. The new Energy Security Bill just introduced to Parliament by the Business Secretary will exclude fusion reactors from the provisions of the NIA 1965.
Ministers claim that fusion does not present the same 'higher hazards' found in fission plants, but the NFLA fears that their decision is about making the UK attractive to investors in their haste to make the UK a 'fusion industry superpower' rather than prioritising public safety.
In its response to the Department of Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) consultation, the NFLA had called for 'no watering down' of the regime, challenging the notion that fusion was largely without risk.
For research commissioned by the NFLA revealed that fusion would result in the production of large quantities of radioactive waste, with the risk that radioactive tritium could enter the water supply. Fusion also requires immense temperatures, hotter than the sun, to spark and sustain a fusion reaction and this energy must be safely contained using challenging and unproven engineering solutions. Operation would also result in the whole structure being subjected to prolonged exposure to neutron radiation, a situation which if not carefully monitored could result in the very integrity of the reactor vessel being placed in jeopardy.
On waste management and decommissioning, the government's position is even more unclear with ministers calling it 'premature' to outline clear proposals at this time, something the NFLA is especially perturbed about.
Councillor Blackburn added: "It is a shame that ministers have missed a trick by refusing to state clearly that future operators will have to share a greater burden of the cost of decommissioning and waste management, rather than passing the bill to the Nuclear Liabilities Fund and ultimately the British taxpayer."
Cannabis News World posted: "Meet Two Asian-American CEOs Blazing New Paths in Cannabis green enterpre Judy Yee and Eunice Kim have overcome stigmas and judgment to run top companies. Excerpt only ... READ MORE BELOW Source : Meet Two Asian-American CEOs Blazing New Paths i" Cannabis News World
Meet Two Asian-American CEOs Blazing New Paths in Cannabis green enterpre Judy Yee and Eunice Kim have overcome stigmas and judgment to run top companies.
Christina Macpherson posted: " NYC Prepares People for 'Big One' With Nuclear Attack PSA Video. By Isabella Steger, July 12, 2022 The city of New York released a public service announcement video outlining the three steps that residents should take in case of a nuc" nuclear-news
Christina Macpherson posted: " Eurasia Times. By Parth Satam, July 11, 2022 Australia's new Defense Minister Richard Marles' recent comment about "hi-tech arms" being "more important" than "nuclear submarines" while being in the US to meet his counterpart, Secretary of Defe" nuclear-news
Australia's new Defense Minister Richard Marles' recent comment about "hi-tech arms" being "more important" than "nuclear submarines" while being in the US to meet his counterpart, Secretary of Defense Llyod Austin, presents a grim future for the Australia-United Kingdom-United States (AUKUS) pact.
This comes amidst Prime Minister Anthony Albanese's government's outreach to China, deployment and technical shortcomings with the USS Virginia-class nuclear submarines, and; oversight of the International Atomic Energy (IAEA) regarding the use of nuclear propulsion material some of the dampeners staring at Canberra.
Sky News Australia reported that this was Marles' first since assuming office, making the statement a significant signal.
The AUKUS deal was announced on September 15 last year under then Prime Minister Scott Morrison in a secret agreement with Washington and London that envisages Australia acquiring at least eight nuclear submarines.
............ the deal's biggest drawback is the monetary, operational, and technical challenges more than the political repercussions.
Nuclear Submarines Overrated?
The first submarine, which is probably a version of the US Virginia class attack, will not be operationally available until the early 2040s and the last vessel by 2060.
The extended timeline that will leave the Royal Australian Navy without serious undersea capability calls for a stopgap interim arrangement. It could be an improved version of the Swedish-origin Collins-class ship to bridge the looming capability gap.
The Virginia class has been afflicted with maintenance problems and, over the last 33 years, has only performed 15 six-monthly deployments. Conventionally powered submarines are now commonly equipped with air-independent propulsion (AIP), which makes them quieter than nuclear submarines.
The latter must keep their reactor cooling pumps going and use noisy giant meshing gears between the steam turbines and propellers.
Nuclear submarines can also be detected by their constant release of hot water by leaving wakes on the surface when running at high speeds. A section of naval strategists within the US has been making a case for a return to diesel-electric or AIP-powered boats, given the technological improvements that have enhanced their speed, submerged endurance, and diving depths.
Diesel-electrics and AIP SSKs like the Swedish Gotland class or the Indian Navy's Russian origin Kilo-class have also 'sank' US carriers often in exercises. Worse, the nuclear propulsion of the Virginia-class is not suitable in the littoral, shallow waters of the South and East China Seas.....
Naval bases in the first island chain around China like Guam, Subic Bay, Singapore, and Okinawa already provide proximity making attributes like range and endurance irrelevant, making conventional submarines more suited for the task.
The cost of the project also dwarfs Australia's financial wherewithal. Australia's defense budget this financial year stood at $48.6 billion.
But the upgraded USS Virginia-class boat that the AUKUS pact promises would be $3.5 billion per unit alone. This doesn't include the highly sophisticated infrastructure required to maintain the fleet, which will entail additional expenses and having to rely on UK and US support until the facilities are functioning.
While former Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison had announced that the submarines would be built within the country, the construction of advanced nuclear-powered submarines involves steep learning curves, experience, and transfer of technology costs.
Morrison had announced that the hulls would be fabricated in Australia and then sent to the US to install nuclear propulsion and other components. Only time will tell what will be the order book at overburdened US shipyards like the General Dynamics Electric Boat then.
Nuclear Proliferation Safeguards
Lastly, possible run-ins with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the UN's nuclear watchdog, will likely trigger different diplomatic hurdles. The IAEA prohibits the transfer of fissile material for nuclear purposes, preventing the use of nuclear fuel from Australia's civil nuclear power plants from diverting it for the nuclear submarines.
Australia may be exempted under Paragraph 14 of the standard pact with the IAEA that allows the transfer of nuclear material for "non-prescribed military activity" like nuclear weapons or explosive nuclear material. But that raises a question of a different standard for Iran, whose IAEA-approved civil nuclear program is heavily monitored and safeguarded.
Christina Macpherson posted: " The French government wants to expand nuclear production in France and it also wants EDF to spend big money on the rehabilitation of numerous nuclear power generating stations. It has put pressure on EDF to embrace those policies and we suspect that it " nuclear-news
The French government wants to expand nuclear production in France and it also wants EDF to spend big money on the rehabilitation of numerous nuclear power generating stations. It has put pressure on EDF to embrace those policies and we suspect that it could force the issue as the majority shareholder.
France plans to renationalize EDF, its giant utility. That doesn't sound like a big deal because the government already owns 84% of EDF's outstanding shares.
But here is how we read the story.
The French government wants to expand nuclear production in France and it also wants EDF to spend big money on the rehabilitation of numerous nuclear power generating stations. It has put pressure on EDF to embrace those policies and we suspect that it could force the issue as the majority shareholder.
But a board of directors, with a fiduciary responsibility to shareholders and other providers of capital, would have a hard time approving a strategy that looked too risky or economically uncompetitive. EDF is, after all, not a division of the ministry of defense, but rather a somewhat privatized company with the government as its biggest and controlling shareholder. At least that is the appearance it would want to give to its shareholders. If France requires more nuclear power for geopolitical or strategic reasons, despite its seeming cost disadvantage in the marketplace, we have no quarrel with that decision.
Our issue is with the current policy—to require some non-governmental shareholders to bear national security burdens and take financial risks that really belong uniquely to the government. The French have approached the matter with admirable clarity.
Christina Macpherson posted: " I don't disagree with the opinion here, but why does no-one ever suggest STOPPING MAKING RADIOACTIVE TRASH ? Roy Payne: FINLAND and Sweden are building their GDFs under the Balticsea. In the UK, the deepest potash mine in Europe stretches out for 20" nuclear-news
I don't disagree with the opinion here, but why does no-one ever suggest STOPPING MAKING RADIOACTIVE TRASH ?
Roy Payne: FINLAND and Sweden are building their GDFs under the Baltic sea. In the UK, the deepest potash mine in Europe stretches out for 20km under the North Sea, and is as bone dry as any desert when you are 1km beneath the surface. The European Parliament has conducted its own independent analysis, 'The World Nuclear Waste Report 2020', which concluded geological disposal is the 'least worst option' for the long-term management of radioactive waste.
This is also the position of the German Green Party, one of whose MEPs led the report. Those concerned about burying radioactive waste deep underground argue the waste should be kept on the surface – presumably on the assumption that over the next 100,000 years the planet's surface will remain as constant, benign and unchanging as deep rock formations, AND that humans will never ever make a mistake. There are only two options available to us with regards radioactive waste — keep it overground on the surface or bury it deep underground.
Because IF something goes wrong, it will either go wrong deep underground, or it will go wrong overground on the surface. You don't need to have a PhD to work out which is the lesser of two evils — radioactivity leaking underground harmlessly far away from the surface and people (which has happened once), or radioactivity on the surface leaking instantly into the air we breathe, the soil we grow our food in, and the water we drink.
But those are our only two choices — hence why the European Parliament, German Green Party, and the international scientific community conclude that geological disposal is the 'least worst option'. I have no axe to grind for NWS, and I certainly do not advocate for more nuclear. Nor do I advocate for a GDF in Cumbria. But I do believe that if we are to build a greener future, we have an ethical and environmental responsibility to start the process of cleaning up the mess we've inherited.
Christina Macpherson posted: " CSIRO says nuclear is too slow, too expensive, and its best prospects for a significant share of global generation are in weak climate targets. The post Slow, expensive and no good for 1.5° target: CSIRO crushes Coalition nuclear fantasy appeared fir" nuclear-news
CSIRO says nuclear is too slow, too expensive, and its best prospects for a significant share of global generation are in weak climate targets. The post Slow, expensive and no good for 1.5° target: CSIRO crushes Coalition nuclear fantasy appeared first on RenewEconomy.
Australia's leading scientific research organisation, the CSIRO, has delivered a damming blow against the renewed push by the federal Coalition for nuclear power, saying it is expensive, and too slow to make a significant contribution to any serious climate targets.
The latest version of the CSIRO's important GenCost report still ranks nuclear as the most expensive of existing technologies, and at least double or up to five times the cost of "firmed" wind and solar, including storage and transmission costs.
It has long been accepted that existing large scale nuclear is way too expensive and too inflexible to play any role in Australia's future grid, but the pro-nuclear lobby has been pushing the idea of Small Modular Reactors, and has been putting intense pressure on the CSIRO to embrace it.
This argument has been taken up with vigour by the federal Coalition, which has responded to its electoral defeat by appointing a pro-nuclear advocate as energy spokesman, and intensifying its campaign against wind and solar that its members have described as "dole bludgers."
The latest CSIRO GenCost report – which says that wind, solar and storage is clearly the cheapest option in Australia – points out that the intense pressure it received to lower its cost estimates for nuclear comes almost exclusively from ambitious vendors, and their proxies, who have nothing to show for their claims.
There are no SMRs in operation, and none are expected until 2029 at the earliest. CSIRO economist Paul Graham, the lead author of the report, says until the first SMRs are deployed it is not possible to find good evidence about the claims of the industry.
It is interesting to note that in the latest GenCost report, CSIRO notes that only one formal submission was received on nuclear, which argued that the cost estimates of nuclear SMR should be lower.
"Vendors seeking to encourage the uptake of a new technology have proposed theoretical cost estimates, but these cannot be verified until proven through a deployed project," it says.
But perhaps the most damming part of the CSIRO report are what it says about the role of various technologies in differing climate scenarios.
It shows that the weaker the climate target, the greater the share of nuclear power. If countries are serious about achieving 1.5°C target, or even below 2°C, then nuclear is simply too slow to play a significant role, and its share of global generation falls significantly.
Graham puts it this way. If nuclear is to prosper, it will need huge licks of government support, and a significant carbon price. But if the world is aiming for the Paris climate targets and is willing to spend money to get there, then other technologies – mostly wind, solar and storage – will fill that gap.
"(Nuclear) needs some climate policy ambition," Graham told RenewEconomy. "But if there's too much climate policy ambition the other technologies run away with the cost reductions and nuclear can't catch up.
"If it looks like we have to reduce emissions much faster, then it's just too slow to contribute to that."
This graph [on original] illustrates the point. Nuclear (in purple) has a share of around 10-12 per cent of global generation in the "current policies" scenario out to 2030. But this share diminishes out to 2050 in all three scenarios, and particularly those that seek to minimise average global warming.
The current policies scenario represents average global warming of around 2.6°C, while the Global NZE (net zero emissions) by 2050 aims for 1.5°C and the Global NZE post 2050 assumes around 1.7°C.
Christina Macpherson posted: " " in Australia, because we're blessed with the world's best wind and solar resources, I just don't see that nuclear will ever compete," in Australia, wind and solar can still outcompete new-build coal, gas and nuclear. ''our future will be" nuclear-news
" in Australia, because we're blessed with the world's best wind and solar resources, I just don't see that nuclear will ever compete,"
in Australia, wind and solar can still outcompete new-build coal, gas and nuclear.
''our future will be powered by renewables supported by energy storage,"
''We need options for consumers to reduce demand and be rewarded for doing so. We need incentives to shift demand to periods of lower demand, smart meters and internet controls."
'Forget nuclear and simplify electrification' is the message form Australian energy experts for next steps in decarbonisation push. "
Australia has an opportunity to seize the competitive advantage in a future, decarbonised global energy system, but experts warn that governments must do more to simplify the process for households and businesses to go electric.
A research brief prepared by Australian energy experts and published by the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences & Engineering (ATSE) has called for an acceleration of the deployment of renewable energy, arguing the technologies needed to decarbonise Australia's energy system are already available.
Australia has the technologies to avoid a future crisis, but we must act now to lay the foundation of a truly modern energy system," the former head of engineering and system design at the Australian Energy Market Operator, Alex Wonhas, said at the launch of the report.
While the research report suggests that Australia will need a diversity of new energy technologies to play a role in a future decarbonised energy system, experts say there should be a greater focus on the electrification of energy use to reduce Australia's dependence on fossil fuels.
Professor Renate Egan, the CEO of UNSW Energy Institute, says there are minimal technical barriers to the electrification of energy use. However, Australian consumers need greater policy support and more information to confidently choose electric replacements.
"I don't think we have barriers so much as we lack information and incentives," Egan said.
If we can have a coordinated effort around it, it should be possible to have all new homes electrified rather than having gas delivered. It would be better not to be making investments in gas infrastructure now in homes.
"There are a million pieces of small infrastructure that need to be replaced over the next ten years, and we should start right now … every decision you make from now needs to be to electrify."
Electrification of energy use, which involves the replacement of appliances like gas stoves, hot water systems and petrol-fuelled cars replaced with electric alternatives – has been touted as a means of cutting both emissions and energy costs because they can be powered with renewable electricity.
Former Chair of Natural Hazards Research Australia, Katherine Woodthorpe, echoed the view that the natural need to replace appliances provides an opportunity to phase energy consumption away from fossil fuels through electrification.
"Every time you buy a new appliance, buy the electric version. Ditto cars and other parts of your infrastructure at home and at work,"
"Every time you make that decision, you buy electric… it's about making those decisions on a daily basis."
Head of the Battery Storage and Grid Integration Program at the Australian National University, professor Lachlan Blackhall, told the briefing policymakers should support households and businesses to make the switch to electric appliances by working to simplify the process.
"It's important to acknowledge that householders and communities are being asked to do a very significant amount of heavy lifting to support the energy transition," Blackhall said.
"But it can be quite complicated for them."
"The reason we're seeing solar being deployed at such scale is it's now a relatively simple proposition. You walk into your friendly local solar installer, and you can buy a solar system, and we understand how to install it at scale.
"So we really need that same experience when it comes to new technologies in people's homes," Blackhall added.
Former managing director of Ausgrid, George Maltabarow, told the briefing that the electrification of Australia's energy use would require system planners to manage the changing dynamics in the electricity system – but that the technology needed to do so already exists.
"The transition away from fossil fuels will require electrifying everything. The good news is we have all the technologies available. We now need the frameworks to manage the investment," Maltabarow said.
"We need options for consumers to reduce demand and be rewarded for doing so. We need incentives to shift demand to periods of lower demand, smart meters and internet controls."
"Now, does that mean consumers have to stand by monitors to figure out 'what am I going to do to reduce and manage my demand?' – The answer is no because set-and-forget software is available now. It can be tailored to the circumstances of individual households, and consumers can relax about having that available."
Maltabarow added that while nuclear could play a role in decarbonising energy systems in a global context, it was unlikely that current technologies would be able to compete on cost.
"Certainly overseas, [nuclear] is going to be much more of a part of the solution. My own view is that in Australia, because we're blessed with the world's best wind and solar resources, I just don't see that nuclear will ever compete," Maltabarow said.
"I'm not saying that nuclear is not an appropriate decarbonisation technology. I simply can't see it being competitive in the Australian context."
The CSIRO released the latest iteration of its GenCost assessment, comparing the effective cost of new electricity projects in Australia, which again confirmed that firmed wind and solar can still outcompete new-build coal, gas and nuclear.
"If you look at that report, it consistently highlights that in the Australian context, nuclear will be significantly more expensive than the kind of roadmap laid out in the ISP, which largely is that our future will be powered by renewables supported by energy storage," Blackhall added.
Christina Macpherson posted: " InDepth news, By Thalif Deen UNITED NATIONS (IDN) — When UN Secretary-General António Guterres congratulated States Parties to the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) on the successful conclusion of their first meeting in Vienna, his w" nuclear-news
UNITED NATIONS (IDN) — When UN Secretary-General António Guterres congratulated States Parties to the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) on the successful conclusion of their first meeting in Vienna, his warning was dead on target.
"Let's eliminate these weapons before they eliminate us," he said pointing out that nuclear weapons are a deadly reminder of countries' inability to solve problems through dialogue and collaboration.
"These weapons offer false promises of security and deterrence—while guaranteeing only destruction, death, and endless brinksmanship," he declared, in a video message to the conference, which concluded on June 23 in the Austrian capital.
Guterres welcomed the adoption of the Political Declaration and Action Plan, which will help set the course for the Treaty's implementation—and are "important steps toward our shared goal of a world free of nuclear weapons".
"We are enduring continued violence in Ukraine, new nuclear threats issued by Russia including a possibility of sharing nuclear weapons with Belarus, in the context of tens of billions of dollars in armaments being poured into Ukraine by the US, and a brutal and careless rush to expand the boundaries of NATO to include Finland and Sweden despite promises given to Gorbachev that NATO would not expand east of Germany, when the wall came down and the Warsaw Pact was dissolved."
She said the news in the Western Media has been unrelentingly critical of Putin and has barely mentioned the new treaty to ban the bomb, despite the stunning Declaration issued in Vienna.
The States Parties, she pointed out, proposed thoughtful plans to move forward on establishing various bodies to deal with the many promises of the treaty including steps for monitoring and verifying the total elimination of nuclear weapons under a limited time frame, with full cognizance of the relationship between the TPNW and the Non-Proliferation Treaty.
"They provide for the development of unprecedented victims assistance for the dreadful suffering and radiation poisoning visited upon so many poor and indigenous communities during the long, horrible and devastating era of nuclear testing, weapons development, waste pollution and more", said Slater who is also the UN Representative for the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation.
Dr M.V. Ramana, Professor and Simons Chair in Disarmament, Global and Human Security, Graduate Program Director, MPPGA, School of Public Policy and Global Affairs at the University of British Columbia, Vancouver, told IDN the meeting of the States parties to the TPNW offers one of the few positive ways forward from the dangerous nuclear situation that the world is confronting.
"Russia's attack on Ukraine and its nuclear threats have served as reminders of the fact that as long as nuclear weapons exist, they can be used, albeit under rare circumstances."
As famed truth teller/whistle blower Daniel Ellsberg has pointed out over the decades, nuclear weapons can be used in two senses: one of exploding them over an enemy target (as happened in Hiroshima and Nagasaki) and the other sense of threatening to explode them if the adversary did something that was not acceptable to the possessor of the nuclear arsenal, Dr Ramana said.........................................
According to ICAN, the Vienna meeting also took a number of decisions on practical aspects of moving forward with implementation of the Treaty which was adopted on June 23, 2022.
Christina Macpherson posted: " Output from Golfech plant may be reduced from ThursdayThat comes as Europe needs France's electricity more than ever By Lars Paulsson July 12, 2022 The hot weather hitting Europe this week is set to reduce power output from France's fleet of" nuclear-news
The hot weather hitting Europe this week is set to reduce power output from France's fleet of nuclear reactors, risking even higher electricity prices as the continent endures its worst energy crunch in decades.
Warm temperatures in the Garonne River mean that production restrictions are likely at the Golfech nuclear plant in the south of the country from Thursday, Electricite de France SA said in a filing with grid operator RTE. Temperatures in France and the Iberia region will be well above average over the next five days and even hotter next week, according to forecaster Maxar. ..... (subscribers only) https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-07-12/french-nuclear-output-seen-curtailed-as-river-temperatures-rise#xj4y7vzkg
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WTX News posted: "Mo Farah reveals he was trafficked to the UK as a child Quick Summary Sir Mo Farah reveals he was trafficked to UK as a child Was forced to work as a domestic servant for several years His real name is Hussein Abdi Kahin Home Office have co" WTX News
British Olympic star Mo Farah has revealed in a BBC documentary that he was brought to the UK illegally as a child and forced to work as a domestic servant.
Editorial Team posted: "Discover how to stay relevant among fierce competition. Watch our free on-demand webinar led by the USAA President & CEO Wayne Peacock where he'll share lessons learned over his 30-plus year career. Find out more at https://ift.tt/EF5NIUp via E" Technology & Business News
Discover how to stay relevant among fierce competition. Watch our free on-demand webinar led by the USAA President & CEO Wayne Peacock where he'll share lessons learned over his 30-plus year career. Find out more at https://ift.tt/EF5NIUp via Entrepreneur.com
Editorial Team posted: "In today's episode of The MarketBeat Podcast Kate chats with Peter Tanous, investment advisor and author of "The Pure Equity Plus Plan: Your Path To A Multi-Million Dollar Retirement." Find out more at https://ift.tt/jGJfBQu via Entrepreneur.com" Technology & Business News
In today's episode of The MarketBeat Podcast Kate chats with Peter Tanous, investment advisor and author of "The Pure Equity Plus Plan: Your Path To A Multi-Million Dollar Retirement." Find out more at https://ift.tt/jGJfBQu via Entrepreneur.com
Mama's Empty Nest posted: " Many people are familiar with the fact that Amish communities reside in Pennsylvania. They may even know that Lancaster County is the oldest and most well-known area for Amish settlements. Papa and I often have toured, stayed in, and traveled through " Mama's Empty Nest
Many people are familiar with the fact that Amish communities reside in Pennsylvania. They may even know that Lancaster County is the oldest and most well-known area for Amish settlements.
Papa and I often have toured, stayed in, and traveled through Lancaster which is a popular tourist attraction area because of the Amish's existence. But one place we had never visited is Sight and Sound Theatre, where Bible stories come to life, located in Ronks, PA.
We remedied that on our road trip vacation last month. Knowing we'd travel through Lancaster County, we searched online to see if we could procure tickets for the latest live production of David, the Biblical story of a beloved shepherd boy chosen by God to become Israel's king.
David was not only courageous and a great warrior, but he was a man after God's own heart. Not perfect by any means, he failed miserably in his sins, but repented, was forgiven, and returned to the God he loved. David's intellect and devotion to God is evident in his song (or psalm) writing, where is recorded in the Bible's book of Psalms.
Papa and I had heard what marvelous productions Sight and Sound Theatre offered, so we purchased our tickets online and attended the sold-out performance on our first day of vacation.
This beautiful theater is a very attractive (and busy) place. Outside of the massive theater, a statue of a Lion and Lamb together is a spot that garners a lot of attention. Before and after each show, throngs of people attempt to get their photo taken in front of it.
I managed a quick photo (trying not to get too many people in it) with my cell phone. I left my DSLR camera in our vehicle since no cameras or recording devices are allowed inside the theater during the performance.
Once we were admitted to the lobby, a tantalizing aroma of roasted almonds, sold in the concession area, wafted to us. We easily found our seats even though there are plenty of ushers to assist ticket holders. And we settled down, people watching as we waited for the production to begin.
And what a production it was! Amazing really. David's story was told in two acts beginning with his time as a young boy sent to the field to learn how to be a shepherd to his death and final words.
The sets were spectacular with some three stories high and spread out on both sides of the center stage. Costumes and props so authentic looking – even David's harp had been hand carved by a harp maker - one truly felt transported back to Biblical times.
Live animals, including horses, sheep, and goats added to the fun. I'm still boggled as to how those sheep were trained to do exactly what they were supposed to because, you know, sheep are considered kinda dumb.
Live actors performed to professionally recorded music and they were marvelous with excellent speaking and singing voices. But the truly amazing scene was young David aiming his slingshot at a mechanical 22-foot tall Goliath and taking him down. I'm still not sure how the theater managed to create Goliath, but it was awe-inspiring.
This particular production took fours years to bring to fruition, partly because of the pandemic lockdown, but I suspect most all theater goers who experienced it would say it was worth the wait.
According to the theater program booklet, Sight and Sound Theatres (located not only near Lancaster but also in Branson, Missouri) began as a simple slide show in 1964 presented by Lancaster County dairy farmer Glenn Eshelman. By the mid 1970's, he and his wife Shirley needed a permanent place to hold their shows, opening a theater for that purpose.
After adding live components to their programs, an even larger theater was necessary by 1991. However, that facility was destroyed by fire just a few years later. Not deterred by the disaster, the founders then opened a 2,000-seat, state of the art theater and the theater's live productions became increasingly popular through the early 2000's.
That in turn prompted them to open a second theater in Branson in 2008. Not only does Sight And Sound present live and very professional performances at both theaters but they also release DVDs, launched online streaming across the world in 2020, and have branched into movies.
What began simply as a farmer's way of portraying God's beautiful creation while sharing His Word eventually became a family-owned business employing 700 people who bring the Bible to life via live theater, television, and film.
Sight and Sound Theatres also offers a two-year apprenticeship at its Conservatory for performing artists who desire to give Christ-centered performances. Those enrolled take classes in acting, singing, dancing, and other theatrical courses as well as perform professionally in the theater's musical stage productions.
The production David is ongoing through December at the Lancaster theater while on the Branson stage, theater-goers can attend Jesus until October.
For more information, visit Sight and Sound Theatre website
After a few hours of travel, we were glad we visited this one-of-a-kind theater to watch the story of David unfold before us. The sounds and sights we experienced there added enjoyment and enrichment to our day as well as reminding us of the beautifully told story of God's chosen king, from whom an even greater King would come to save us all.
His name is Jesus.
"A day spent without the sight or sound of beauty, the contemplation of mystery, or the search of truth or perfection is a poverty-stricken day; and a succession of such days is fatal to human life." ~ Lewis Mumford
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Has the Cannabis Bubble Popped? Cannabis life network Has the cannabis bubble popped? Stocks are down, funds are drying up, and balance sheets are messy. Assets managed by cannabis funds are down by 45% in twelve months. They've reportedly lost $2.6 billion from $4.6 billion the previous year. Morningstar, an investment research firm, provided the data. What Happened? Investors blame a popped cannabis […] The post Has the Cannabis Bubble Popped? appeared first on Cannabis News, Lifestyle - Headlines, Videos & Cooking.
Sure, some people may claim cops encounter dogs all the time without killing them, but cops are the only ones killing (see above link) “25 to 30” pet dogs every day. Killing pets is something people normally attribute to budding mass murderers, but cops walk around every day doing this and most people still think they’re not psychopaths.
More than half the federal circuits have held that killing someone’s pet is a violation of the Fourth Amendment. But those holdings are pock-marked with loopholes. And this recent Sixth Circuit Appeals Court decision [PDF] makes it clear that when it comes down to a tussle between a cop’s dog and a regular person’s dog, the regular dog’s death will be a justified killing.
In this case, cops already had their man. The fleeing suspect had been apprehended. But the Detroit police officers believed the suspect had ditched a gun. An officer brought a K-9 “officer” out to sniff for the (alleged) weapon. This required the officer to take the dog across several people’s yards. This is what happened next.
Bodycam and security camera footage captured the events that followed. Officer Shirlene Cherry arrived at the scene with her trained canine, Roky. The White family had two dogs outside, Chino, a pit bull, and Twix, a Yorkie Terrier. Officer Cherry asked White's daughter, Mi-Chol, to secure the dogs during the search for the weapon. Mi-Chol grabbed Chino to put him inside their home, but he escaped and ran to the front yard. Mi-Chol went inside to grab a leash. With Chino still roaming the fenced-in yard, Officer Cherry decided to take Roky to a neighboring yard to search there first. They walked along the perimeter of the wrought-iron fence toward the next yard while Chino followed them from the other side of the fence.
Then the unexpected happened. As Officer Cherry and Roky reached the corner of the yard, Chino lurched through the fence's vertical spires and bit down on Roky's snout. Roky yelped. Cherry turned and saw Roky trapped up against the fence with his nose in Chino's mouth. Cherry tugged at Roky's leash and yelled at Chino to "let go." Nothing changed. Chino began "thrashing," "swaying back and forth in an effort to tear" what he was holding. Unable to free Roky and afraid for the dog's life, Cherry unholstered her gun and shot Chino once.
What is a reasonable amount of time to de-escalate a dog-on-dog altercation? That question can’t be answered. All we have is this data point, which suggests anything under six seconds is more than enough time to justify the use of deadly force to end it.
Six seconds passed between Chino's attack and Cherry's shot. After the shot, Chino released the now-bloodied Roky. Chino died from the shot.
Killing another animal to save a police animal is just good police work, says the Sixth Circuit. Never mind that they’re both animals. One has been elevated: it is a “police” animal, which makes it the equivalent of a fellow officer. This isn’t an underhanded exaggeration. In many places, assaulting a police dog is treated no differently than assaulting a police human. The criminal penalties are nearly identical.
When it’s dog-on-dog, only one dog is truly protected by law. And the court isn’t going to second-guess cops who see their pet being attacked by a citizen’s pet.
What of the alternatives? What of other reasonable options short of Officer Cherry's lethal use of force? Commands for Chino to "let go" did not do the trick. Several forceful pulls on the leash still left Roky at Chino's unmistakable beck and unrelenting call. Only the ignorant peace of a judge's chamber would prompt the passing thought that the officer should use her hands to remove the one dog from the other. That of course would replace one hazard with another, and in the process insert the officer, never a judge, into harm's path. Officer Cherry, it is true, had a taser, and perhaps a taser might have spared Roky and Chino. But Officer Cherry believed that the taser would serve only as a "muscle stimulant" and further "lock [Chino's] jaw," leaving Roky in continuing peril. Maybe; maybe not. But there were enough maybes in this unnerving situation to permit Officer Cherry to respond to these "tense, uncertain, and rapidly evolving" circumstances, Graham, 490 U.S. at 397, with decisive action that increased the likelihood of saving Roky: shooting the source of the peril. Shooting an attacking dog to save a behaving police dog is not unreasonable.
In this situation, it’s only perhaps less unreasonable than other situations. In this case, the officer patrolled another yard while waiting for the pet owner to secure their dog. That was a smart move and it should not weigh against the officer.
The problem is the standard. It will always allow police dogs to be more valuable than family pets. No cop takes a dog out for a stroll. Every time a police dog is on a scene, it will be a “rapidly evolving” situation. Whether it’s an evolving threat (like the one here) or a latent threat (literally any pet located anywhere a cop and their dog happen to be), the cops will win and the people paying their salary will lose. A perceived threat to a human officer is enough to justify deadly force. A subjective threat to a cop’s dog will also justify acts of violence.
Granted, this is not an ideal case. One dog attacked another. But the standard set by the court makes it clear certain animals are more important than others. And that makes this coda ring a bit hollow.
The problem in this case is not the law's lack of appreciation for the Whites' love of their dog. It is that the lives of two dogs were at risk. Officer Cherry permissibly considered that reality in killing one and saving the other.
There was no perfect solution to the situation facing the officer and her K-9. But this ruling is precedent — a published opinion. And it says — once everything else is stripped away — that police can kill pets when they feel they need to without having to worry too much about being successfully sued. And if the police dog had been the aggressor and the other dog had merely responded to an attack, I doubt the judicial outcome would have changed.
It amazes me that the narrative is still out there about how China is an “intellectual property thief” and that the US and other western nations need to “convince China to respect intellectual property.” We heard that for decades, but for over a decade now, we’ve been pointing out that China responded to all that scolding by massively ramping up its efforts to obtain patents for Chinese companies, and then using those patents to sue western companies. That is, just as we predicted, all the screaming to pressure China into “respecting IP” was literally handing China a protectionist weapon. Which it’s been using. A lot. To the point that some US officials have started freaking out, and arguing that the US should ignore Chinese attempts to enforce its patents.
The Financial Times has an article on the latest, which is that China is basically now a patenting powerhouse and is using it to cause serious trouble, especially when it comes to patents used in standards, or so called “standard essential patents” or SEPs. We’ve talked about SEPs in the past, as they’re incredibly lucrative if you can get your patent included in a SEP, as it’s basically a ticket for printing money… and for making sure that basic core technology has to come from certain companies. And that’s of tremendous interest to Chinese telecommunications equipment firms…
In what some lawyers see as a trend, Chinese companies have become increasingly assertive in the relatively narrow field of "standard essential patents". So-called SEPs are used widely in the telecommunications industry to license and provide access to patented technologies.
In recent years, Chinese courts have issued four key cross-border "anti-suit injunctions" following claims made by the country's massive telecom equipment and smartphone groups — Huawei, Xiaomi, ZTE and Oppo — in disputes against Germany's Conversant, US group InterDigital, and Japan's Sharp.
Of course, once again, China doing this is… just copying how patenting and patent suits work in the US. They learned it from watching us. Again.
In February, at the World Trade Organization, the EU complained about China and these cases, noting that the penalties from anti-suit injunctions are "typically set at the maximum level allowed for under Chinese Civil Procedure Law" — roughly Rmb1mn per day, or $157,000. The US, Japan and Canada have subsequently joined the WTO proceedings.
Yet the Chinese courts were not the first to issue orders to stop a company from pursuing proceedings in SEP disputes in other jurisdictions. Anti-suit injunctions have been on the rise across the US, the UK, Germany and India since a dispute between Microsoft and Motorola 10 years ago.
And yet, none of this will matter. The narrative is so entrenched that I’m sure we’ll continue hearing more and more stories about how the US needs to get China to “respect intellectual property” as Chinese firms laugh all the way to the courts…
from the china's-national-bird-is-the-third-person-ostrich dept
by Tim Cushing - July 11th @ 1:41pm
The problem with gathering tons of sensitive data and storing it indefinitely is sooner or later someone with even worse intentions is going to come looking for it. And China’s massive surveillance apparatus collects oh so much data.
It’s far too tempting to resist. Someone with the guts and audacity to go after one of the most repressive regimes in the world has made a mockery of the government’s security measures and is now, presumably, making a tidy profit. Rachel Cheung has the details for Motherboard.
An anonymous hacker is selling a massive database that allegedly contains the personal information of a billion Chinese citizens, more than two-thirds of the country's population.
In a recent post on the cybercrime site Breach Forums, a user going by ChinaDan claimed to offer more than 23 terabytes of data for 10 bitcoin, which is around $200,000. The trove of data was allegedly leaked from a Shanghai police database.
Researchers and journalists are still trying to verify the hacker’s claims. ChinaDan released 750,000 files, which is still only a very small percentage of the alleged total haul. Some of the criminal records released have been verified, suggesting this reported breach may be legitimate.
Not only is there the potential for massive fraud, what with apparent access to the credentials and other personal information belonging to nearly one billion people, there’s plenty that could be used to embarrass Chinese residents, personally or professionally.
Another file listed 250,000 reports of crime to Shanghai authorities. They include cases of looting, online fraud, and domestic abuse, as well as offenses as petty as a 43-year-old getting an "illegal" handjob for 50 yuan (about $7.5) at a bathhouse in 2004.
And the damage could go further than simply ruining someone financially via regular old identity fraud. This being China, a truly malicious person could theoretically convert stolen credentials into lifetime imprisonment for victims by using this info to fire up accounts on internet services to traffic in anti-government rhetoric.
There’s a private (well… as private as a company can be in China) contractor in the mix as well. Alibaba’s cloud service apparently hosted the database. In a comment to Motherboard, the company said it was aware of the incident and was investigating.
The alleged hack set Chinese social media abuzz for a brief period over the weekend, but by Monday microblogging network Weibo and Tencent's WeChat had begun to censor the topic.
Hashtags such as "data leak", "Shanghai national security database breach" and "1 billion citizens' records leak", which had amassed millions of views and comments, were blocked on Twitter-like Weibo.
One Weibo user with 27,000 followers said a viral post about the hack had been removed by censors and that she had already been invited by local authorities to discuss the post.
So far, so China. The censorship is in full effect. And the government, which should feel obligated to inform citizens their personal information has possibly been compromised, refuses to discuss the hacking. According to the Financial Times, numerous branches of the Shanghai government have refused to comment on the incident and the agency in charge of national data security (Cyberspace Administration of China) chose not to respond to reporters’ questions.
I realize the Chinese government cares far more about its well-being than the concerns of its billions of constituents, but burying bad news and pretending it isn’t happening is insanely harmful. But, in the end, it will be citizens that are harmed the most, so why should the government care?
We have done many, many posts explaining how, unfortunately, it seems the idea of a person owning the things they’ve bought has become rather passe. While in the age of antiquity, which existed entire tens of years ago, you used to be able to own things, these days you merely license them under Ts and Cs that are either largely ignored and clicked through or that are indecipherable, written in the otherwise lost language known as “Lawyer-ese”. The end result is a public that buys things, thinks they retain ownership over them, only to find out that the provider of the things alters them, limits their use, or simply erases them from being.
Take anyone who bought a movie distributed by StudioCanal in Germany and Austria through Sony’s Playstation store, for instance. Sony previously had a deal to make those movie titles available in its store, but declined to continue offering movies and shows in 2021, stating that streaming services had made the deal un-competitive.
Sony's PlayStation group stopped offering movie and TV show purchases and rentals, as of Aug. 31, 2021, citing the rise of streaming-video services. At the time, Sony assured customers that they "can still access movie and TV content they have purchased through PlayStation Store for on-demand playback on their PS4, PS5 and mobile devices.
And when Sony said that, it apparently forgot to add two very important words to its statement: “for now.” Instead, Sony decided to drop the bomb with yet another statement regarding StudioCanal content in Germany and Austria. It essentially amounts to: hey fuckers, that shit you bought is about to disappear, mmkay bye.
"As of August 31, 2022, due to our evolving licensing agreements with content providers, you will no longer be able to view your previously purchased Studio Canal content and it will be removed from your video library," the notices read. "We greatly appreciate your continued support."
Poof, it’s gone! That remark about appreciating the public’s “continued support” seems more like begging than acknowledging reality. Especially once you start asking the questions that immediately leap to mind.
For example: will customers get a refund for the movies that they bought and now can’t access? As per the source article “it’s unclear”, which likely means “hahahahaha nope.” How many movies were delisted? Literally hundreds. Are these just small-time movies? Nope, they include AAA titles like The Hunger Games and John Wick.
And so a whole bunch of people are going to find out that they didn’t buy anything, they rented some movies for a previously indefinite period of time that just became definite, long after the purchase was made. It’s hard to imagine something more anti-consumer than that.
The internet is about speech. That’s basically all the internet is. It’s a system for communicating, and that communication is speech. What’s becoming increasingly frustrating to me is how in all of these attempts to regulate the internet around the globe, policymakers (and many others) seem to ignore that, and act as if they can treat internet issues like other non-speech industries. We see it over and over again. Privacy law for the internet? Has huge speech implications. Antitrust for the internet? Yup, speech implications.
That’s not to argue that all such regulations can’t be done in ways that don’t violate free speech rights, but to note that those who completely ignore the free speech implications of their regulations are going to create real problems for free speech.
The latest area where this is showing up is that the UN has been working on a “Cybercrime Treaty.” And, you can argue that having a more global framework for responding to internet-based crime sounds like a good thing, especially as such criminal behavior has been rapidly growing. However, the process is already raising lots of concerns about the potential impact on human rights. And, most specifically, there are massive concerns about how a Cybercrime Treaty might include speech related crimes.
So it is concerning that some UN Member States are proposing vague provisions to combat hate speech to a committee of government representatives (the Ad Hoc Committee) convened by the UN to negotiate a proposed UN Cybercrime treaty. These proposals could make it a cybercrime to humiliate a person or group, or insult a religion using a computer, even if such speech would be legal under international human rights law.
Including offenses based on harmful speech in the treaty, rather than focusing on core cybercrimes, will likely result in overbroad, easily abused laws that will sweep up lawful speech and pose an enormous menace to the free expression rights of people around the world. The UN committee should not make that mistake.
As we’ve been noting for years, “hate speech laws” are almost always abused by governments to silence dissent, rather than protect the marginalized. Indeed, one look at the countries pushing for the Cybercrime Treaty to include hate speech crimes should give you a sense of the intent of the backers:
For example, Jordan proposes using the treaty to criminalize "hate speech or actions related to the insulting of religions or States using information networks or websites," while Egypt calls for prohibiting the "spreading of strife, sedition, hatred or racism." Russia, jointly with Belarus, Burundi, China, Nicaragua, and Tajikistan, also proposed to outlaw a wide range of vaguely defined speech intending to criminalize protected speech: "the distribution of materials that call for illegal acts motivated by political, ideological, social, racial, ethnic, or religious hatred or enmity, advocacy and justification of such actions, or to provide access to such materials, by means of ICT (information and communications technology)," as well as "humiliation by means of ICT (information and communications technology) of a person or group of people on account of their race, ethnicity, language, origin or religious affiliation."
It’s like a who’s who of countries known for oppressing dissent at every opportunity.
Once again, it’s reasonable to argue that there should be some more regulations for the internet, but if you don’t recognize how those will be abused to stifle speech, you’re a part of the problem.
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Cops have been running to Google for years, warrants and subpoenas in hand, asking the data behemoth to give them info they can sift through to find criminal suspects. Location data is a big one. Comparable to cell phone tower dumps, geofence warrants allow law enforcement to obtain a certain amount of data on every phone in an area, allowing them to work backwards towards probable cause to seek identifying data on possible suspects. But the only “probable cause” needed for the original, Google-enabled search is the (strong) probability Google has data responsive to the request.
Another backdoor to probable cause is keyword warrants. These are even more questionable since it’s not just the Fourth Amendment being implicated. Getting data dumps on everyone who might have searched for certain terms wanders into First Amendment territory, making people suspects just because they’ve attempted to access information.
These have been increasing in popularity over the past several years as law enforcement moves towards internet-based alternatives to canvassing neighborhoods to ask people if they’ve seen anything suspicious. This has led to some really strange interpretations of probable cause, like cops searching for anyone who searched for a certain person’s name while investigating bank fraud.
That case was a half-decade ago. And the request was granted, presumably because the judge felt it was likely Google had responsive data: the supposed “probable cause.” It’s only now that one of these keyword warrants is being challenged by someone other than the original recipient. Here’s Jon Schuppe, reporting for NBC News. (h/t Michael Vario)
A teen charged with setting a fire that killed five members of a Senegalese immigrant family in Denver, Colorado, has become the first person to challenge police use of Google search histories to find someone who might have committed a crime, according to his lawyers.
[…]
In documents filed Thursday in Denver District Court, lawyers for the 17-year-old argue that the police violated the Constitution when they got a judge to order Google to check its vast database of internet searches for users who typed in the address of a home before it was set ablaze on Aug. 5, 2020. Three adults and two children died in the fire.
That search of Google's records helped point investigators to the teen and two friends, who were eventually charged in the deadly fire, according to police records. All were juveniles at the time of their arrests.
The aforementioned document [PDF] (which NBC News inexplicably failed to include with its article) opens with a concise, but powerful, point-by-point discussion of everything that’s wrong with warrants that allow law enforcement to ransack digital warehouses in hopes of finding something it can work with.
A reverse keyword search is a novel and uniquely intrusive digital dragnet of immense proportions. It requires Google to search billions of people's search queries—everyone who ran a Google search—and produce information on anyone who looked for certain search terms, or keywords. Here, the government searched for, and then seized, the personal data associated with everyone who searched for nine variations of an address, "5312 Truckee Street," over the course of 15 days in 2020.
That’s not how probable cause, or even reasonable suspicion, works. Possessing a warrant doesn’t really change anything, since the only supporting probable cause is that Google has information, most (if not all, in some cases) that is completely unrelated to the crime being investigated.
In this case, the speculative excursion was far less precise than even that dismissive term would indicate. Google rejected two previous warrants served to it by investigators, suggesting even the investigators had no idea what they were searching for, much less what they expected Google to search for.
But for this reverse keyword search, law enforcement would not have identified Mr. Seymour as a suspect in this case. Indeed, the keyword warrant was preceded by a litany of other constitutionally suspect searches. None of them, however, pointed law enforcement to Mr. Seymour. In fact, the operative keyword warrant, issued on November 19, 2020, was the third keyword warrant issued in this case. Google refused to comply with the first two. And just the day before Denver police obtained the warrant, investigators were interrogating an alternate suspect. Law enforcement went on a massive fishing expedition, trawling through everyone's cell phone records, location data, and Google data—without cause to search any of it—until they identified Mr. Seymour with a third keyword warrant.
Admittedly, banging away until something gives is also a law enforcement technique, but those generally don’t implicate the search engine history of people who haven’t committed crimes. A warrant was obtained, which means discussions about the Third Party Doctrine will be limited (and the fact that most users know Google searches are known, if not stored indefinitely, by Google is another factor), but that doesn’t excuse the apparent abuse of a third party’s date stores to root around for people reasonably suspected of participating in a crime.
While law enforcement may portray this as a search of Google, it is actually a search of Google users and their internet use.
The government searched an ocean of intensely private data in this case, yet it lacked probable cause to search even one Google user. Instead, it demanded that Google search everyone's Google searches in order to generate suspicion. This process is profoundly different from the one that governs the application for and execution of typical warrants, where a suspect is known and the warrant seeks their data. Instead, this "reverse warrant" first identifies categories of data and then seeks information about people whose data falls into those categories.
It’s fishing. It’s not limited, targeted, supported by probable cause, or even based on law enforcement’s evidence gathering to date. In this investigation, investigators and their fishing poles were all over the lake.
Prior to the third keyword warrant, the government executed at least 23 other warrants, escalating over time to "very general search warrants" without any named suspects. […] [P]olice requested a "traditional tower dump" and "specialized location data dump," from four major cell phone carriers, one returned 1,471 "unique devices…within a 1-mile radius" of the fire, and another returned 4,595 devices.
Just pure guesswork. The cops even went wardriving for cell phones.
Police deployed a "cell-site simulator" (a.k.a. "IMSI catcher") in the same neighborhoods in an attempt to "throw out" some numbers. A cell-site simulator is a fake cell phone tower operated by the police from the back of a car. As the police drove the device around Truckee St. on August 20, 2020 at 2 a.m., the simulator forced every cell phone within range to connect to it instead of to the authentic cell phone network. The phones then identified themselves to the police by providing their unique international mobile subscriber identifier ("IMSI") numbers. Police identified 723 devices in the area, most of which belonged to neighbors in private homes. None of this information, however, led investigators to say, "We've got our guy or gal or anything." Id. at 129.
So, it appears this won’t be the only warrant/search technique being challenged in this case. Investigators tried everything and did so with very little lawful justification. This may be the first time a keyword search has been challenged in court, but it also appears another law enforcement favorite — geofence warrants — will be receiving the same treatment from the accused’s defense lawyer.
Police also obtained two Google geofence warrants, one on August 10, 2020, and another on October 6, 2020. […] For reference, Google had 592 million Location History users in 2018. To conduct a geofence search, regardless of the size or shape of the area, Google must comb through the account of every Location History user. That is because Google does not know which users may have responsive data before conducting the search. As a result, the two geofence warrants here, covering six geographic areas, led to the search of hundreds of millions of people, multiple times. Yet, like the prior searches, this approach also failed to produce any "fruitful" leads.
On top of all of this, investigators also went to a data broker to trawl for leads, serving a warrant to “Fog Data Science,” which (according to the description in the filing) appears to gather location data from apps and provide that access to government agencies.
Multiple dragnets. Zero returns. Thousands directly affected. Millions indirectly searched. And only one of the 24 warrants (on top of the Stingray wardriving, which doesn’t appear to have been backed by a warrant) produced anything usable.
The totality is an embarrassing indictment of law enforcement officers’ preference to allow others to do their neighborhood canvassing for them. Searches performed by others and overseen by desk jockeys is a whole lot easier than hitting the streets and looking for eyewitnesses and evidence.
Unfortunately, court decisions are on a case-by-case basis. The totality of this fiasco may be viewed through a very narrow lens that only considers the probability Google retains this data. And that may be all the probable cause needed, especially when Google refuses to provide identifying info until law enforcement offers up something approaching actual probable cause.
Then again, this may be the toe in the door that results in more judicial examination of these fishing expeditions and starts demanding probable cause be related to the suspect being sought, rather than the location of the data cops wish to obtain.
T-Mobile hasn’t been what you’d call competent when it comes to protecting its customers’ data. The company has been hacked numerous different times over the last few years, with hackers going so far as to ridicule the company’s lousy security practices.
A responsible company might slow down on data collection until it was certain it had figured out how to protect the data it collects. But this being the United States, where there’s no real accountability for companies with lax privacy and security standards (outside of four days or so of mean Tweets), T-Mobile has announced that it’s dramatically expanding its collection of user browsing and app download data.
The effort is part of T-Mobile’s new “App Insights" adtech product that was formally launched recently. App Insights will allow marketing companies to further track and target T-Mobile customers based on which apps they've downloaded and their "engagement patterns" with said apps — namely how often they use them, how long they remain open on the device, and other metrics.
As Gizmodo notes, there won’t be many restrictions, allowing microtargeting folks by sexual orientation:
T-Mobile also won't stop marketers from taking things into their own hands. One ad agency exec that spoke with AdExchanger said that one of the "most exciting" things about this new ad product is the ability to microtarget members of the LGBTQ community. Sure, that's not one of the prebuilt personas offered in the App Insights product, "but a marketer could target phones with Grindr installed, for example, or use those audiences for analytics," the original interview notes.
The timing of this dramatic expansion in user app data monetization, at a time when abortion bans and potential vigilante action are forging a profound new seriousness in consumer app policy concerns, is a fairly telling representation of how worried a company like T-Mobile is about privacy-related oversight coming from a generally over-extended, under-funded, and under-staffed FTC (as in, not at all).
As with so many modern companies, T-Mobile over-collects data, then doesn’t take the necessary steps to protect said data. It then lobbies U.S. lawmakers to ensure we don’t shore up U.S. privacy protections (as it did when Congress gutted the FCC’s fairly modest broadband privacy rules), and the cycle repeats itself in perpetuity. Making money is, quite literally, the only policy consideration that matters.
Moon Syouri posted: " Nicki Minaj pleads with fans as overcrowded Camden meet and greet cancelled The Independent: Nicki Minaj pleads with fans as a meet and greet organised in Camden for Nicki Minaj on Monday (11 July) had to be cancelled due to overcrowding. The rapp" WTX News
Bruce Drum posted: "Alaska Airlines is celebrating its 90th anniversary by giving all employees the gift of travel: While many of us were instructed to stay home during the pandemic, airline employees were part of the essential workforce who remained on the front line" World Airline News
Alaska Airlines is celebrating its 90th anniversary by giving all employees the gift of travel:
While many of us were instructed to stay home during the pandemic, airline employees were part of the essential workforce who remained on the front lines. Each day brought new challenges, regulations and precautions that our people had to carefully navigate while continuing to care for our guests, communities and each other.
As we inch our way to a new normal—happily seeing travelers' pent-up desire to hop on a plane—Alaska is taking a moment to thank each employee for their relentless commitment to caring for our guests for 90 years & counting by giving them 90,000 miles to fly anywhere in the world.
"As we celebrate 90 years of flying, we wouldn't be where we are today without our incredible people who work nonstop to keep things moving, even throughout a global pandemic," said CEO Ben Minicucci. "When you think about how many airlines have come and gone since 1932, it's an amazing achievement that we're still here and stronger than ever—it's because of the genuine care and hard work our people bring to our operation every day."
The great thing about miles is they never expire and offer flexibility to travel not just on Alaska, but also on our oneworld partners like British Airways, Qantas, Qatar Airways, Finnair and our other airline partners. Travel awards begin at just 5,000 miles, and can be used to book First Class tickets, a relaxing stay at a hotel or tickets to an anticipated event—there are so many ways to use airline miles!
With 90,000 miles, you can plan a trip to almost anywhere in the world:
For instance, a roundtrip flight from Seattle up and down the West Coast starts at just 10,000 roundtrip, which means you can get you up to nine roundtrip flights!
Roundtrips from Seattle to New York start at 25,000 miles, or even visit Hawaii from San Francisco starting at 30,000 miles roundtrip.
Want to travel internationally? A roundtrip flight to Europe from the West Coast starts at 60,000 miles through our oneworld partners. Mileage prices do vary so search for your travel dates to see the prices for the dates and cabins you want to travel in.
Moon Syouri posted: " National heatwave emergency may be on its way before 'hottest day ever' The Metro: Plans for the first national heatwave emergency are reportedly being drawn up to deal with the soaring temperatures as the UK braces for what could be its hottest day " WTX News
Plans for the first national heatwave emergency are reportedly being drawn up to deal with the soaring temperatures as the UK braces for what could be its hottest day ever this weekend.
Bruce Drum posted: " American Airlines Group Inc. issued its 2021 Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) report on July 11, providing updates on the company's strategy and progress across key issues over the year. The report affirms American's focus on the issues most" World Airline News
American Airlines Group Inc. issued its 2021 Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) report on July 11, providing updates on the company's strategy and progress across key issues over the year. The report affirms American's focus on the issues most important to its business and stakeholders, including climate change; diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI); customer and team member safety; and customer service.
"As the world continues to emerge from the pandemic and reconnect, American Airlines is committed to living our purpose to care for people on life's journey," American's CEO Robert Isom said. "Our environmental, social and governance efforts are key to American's success today and critical to building a resilient airline that will thrive forever."
American's aggressive climate goals include achieving net-zero greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 2050, and the report demonstrates that the company has developed a transparent and credible plan to meet this goal. That includes becoming the first airline globally to receive validation from the Science Based Targets initiative for its intermediate GHG emissions reduction targets and being the only U.S. airline to report using more than 1 million gallons of sustainable aviation fuel in 2021. The report also includes a detailed discussion of American's risks and opportunities related to climate change, as recommended by the Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures.
American continues to work toward improving diverse representation across the company, meeting or exceeding its 2021 targets for Black representation, and setting new goals for 2022. The company is also making strides in increasing pilot diversity, with 25% of pilots hired by American in 2021 self-identifying as people of color. In addition, as part of its strategy to embed DEI throughout the organization, American also became the first airline — and one of only a handful of large U.S. companies — to receive Fair Pay Workplace's inaugural pay equity certification. The company also continues to have an uncompromising commitment to customer and team member safety.
As a result of these and other efforts detailed in the report, American was included in the Dow Jones Sustainability North America Index for the first time in 2021 — the only passenger airline to be included.
American's full ESG report is available at aa.com/esg.
Bruce Drum posted: "airBaltic made this announcement: During June 2022, Latvian airline airBaltic has carried 349,700 passengers or 205% more than during the same period last year. In June 2022, airBaltic flew 3,500 flights. Martin Gauss, Chief Executive Officer of a" World Airline News
During June 2022, Latvian airline airBaltic has carried 349,700 passengers or 205% more than during the same period last year. In June 2022, airBaltic flew 3,500 flights.
Martin Gauss, Chief Executive Officer of airBaltic: "The positive trend of recovering from the Covid-19 crisis continued in June. We see a strong demand for bookings mainly driven by leisure travel."
June, 20221
June, 20212
Change
Number of passengers
349 700
114 700
+205%
Number of flights
3 500
1 780
+97%
We have successfully launched our first ever Office in the sky project! It is as simple and as complex as it sounds - our office employees had the chance to apply, go through the selection process, and complete months of training to become a part of our crew. pic.twitter.com/U04VxZWF1U
It is as simple and as complex as it sounds - our office employees had the chance to apply, go through the selection process, and complete months of training to become a part of our crew. 
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