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Linux has turned 25! Dear all, today is August 25, 2016, and it is time for the celebration, as it's the 25th Anniversary of the Linux project, announced by its creator, Finnish programmer Linus Torvalds , on August 25, 1991. Who can forget one of the most famous messages in the computing world posted by Torvalds exactly 25 years ago today, on 25 August 1991: Hello everybody out there using minix - I'm doing a (free) operating system (just a hobby, won't be big and professional like gnu) for 386(486) AT clones. This has been brewing since april, and is starting to get ready. I'd like any feedback on things people like/dislike in minix, as my OS resembles it somewhat. Since its birth, Linux has become the largest shared technology on the planet and has changed the world in more ways than one can imagine. While not initially designed to be portable, Linux is one of the most widely ported operating system kernels, which runs on a vast range of systems from co...

China has taken one more step forward towards achieving success in Quantum communication technology. China has launched the world's first quantum communications satellite into orbit aboard a Long March-2D rocket earlier today in order to test the fundamental laws of quantum mechanics at space. 'Hack-Proof' Communications System The satellite, dubbed Quantum Science Satellite, is designed to develop a ' Hack-Proof ' communications system in this age of global electronic surveillance and cyber attacks by transmitting uncrackable encryption keys from space to the ground. The 600-plus-kilogram Quantum Science Satellite , better known as Quantum Experiments at Space Scale (QUESS) satellite, took off from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in Gobi Desert at 1:40 AM local time on a 2-year mission on Tuesday. The QUESS satellite will help China perform unprecedented levels of experiments in quantum communication by sending entangled photons from the satellite...

On this day 25 years ago, August 6, 1991, the world's first website went live to the public from a lab in the Swiss Alps. So Happy 25th Birthday, WWW! It's the Silver Jubilee of the world's first website. The site was created by Sir Tim Berners-Lee , the father of the World Wide Web (WWW), and was dedicated to information on the World Wide Web project. The world's first website, which ran on a NeXT computer at the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN), can still be visited today, more than two decades after its creation. The first website address is https://info.cern.ch/hypertext/WWW/TheProject.html . "The WorldWideWeb (W3) is a wide-area hypermedia information retrieval initiative aiming to give universal access to a large universe of documents," the world's first public website reads, going on to explain how others can also create their own web pages. "The project started with the philosophy that much academic information sh...

AI agents promise to automate everything from financial reconciliations to incident response. Yet every time an AI agent spins up a workflow, it has to authenticate somewhere; often with a high-privilege API key, OAuth token, or service account that defenders can't easily see. These "invisible" non-human identities (NHIs) now outnumber human accounts in most cloud environments, and they have become one of the ripest targets for attackers. Astrix's Field CTO Jonathan Sander put it bluntly in a recent Hacker News webinar : "One dangerous habit we've had for a long time is trusting application logic to act as the guardrails. That doesn't work when your AI agent is powered by LLMs that don't stop and think when they're about to do something wrong. They just do it." Why AI Agents Redefine Identity Risk Autonomy changes everything: An AI agent can chain multiple API calls and modify data without a human in the loop. If the underlying credential is exposed or overprivileged, each addit...

Forget about security! It turns out that the Chip-and-PIN cards are just as easy to clone as magnetic stripe cards. It took researchers just a simple chip and pin hack to withdraw up to $50,000 in cash from an ATM in America in under 15 minutes. We have been told that EMV ( Europay, MasterCard and Visa ) chip-equipped cards provides an extra layer of security which makes these cards more secure and harder to clone than the old magnetic stripe cards. But, it turns out to be just a myth. A team of security engineers from Rapid7 at Black Hat USA 2016 conference in Las Vegas demonstrated how a small and simple modifications to equipment would be enough for attackers to bypass the Chip-and-PIN protections and enable unauthorized transactions. The demonstration was part of their presentation titled, "Hacking Next-Gen ATMs: From Capture to Washout," [ PDF ]. The team of researchers was able to show the audience an ATM spitting out hundreds of dollars in cash. Here...

Finally, Someone has come forward to buy Yahoo! Guess Who? The telecommunication giant Verizon . Yes, Verizon Communications Inc. is reportedly closing in on a deal to acquire Yahoo's core business for about $5 Billion, according to a report from Bloomberg. Since the agreement between the companies has not been finalized, it is unclear at this moment that which Yahoo's assets the deal would include. "In order to preserve the integrity of the process, we're not going to comment on the issue until we've finalized an agreement," a Yahoo spokeswoman said in a statement provided to CNNMoney. You might be wondering Why Verizon is buying Yahoo! Well, I'll come to it in the second half of my article, because before discussing this point, let's first focus on why Yahoo! wants to get acquired. Why Yahoo Was Up For Sale? Founded in 1995, Yahoo! was once the brightest star of the Web. But when its rivals including Google, Facebook and even few-years-old com...

Now no more fight with Apple or any smartphone maker, as federal authorities have discovered a new tool for unlocking phones, as far as your phone is using any biometric sensor… 3D Printing! Yes, Police in Michigan is considering 3D printing a dead man's fingers so they could unlock smartphones in investigation crimes using their biometric sensors. A new report published today from Flash Forward creator Rose Eveleth revealed that the police recently approached professors at the University of Michigan to reproduce a dead man's fingerprint from a prerecorded scan. Once reproduced, the 3D print would be used to create a false fingerprint of the dead man, which could then be used to unlock his smartphone using its biometric sensors. The man was a murder victim, and law enforcement investigators believed that his phone might contain some useful information relevant to the case. Why Police Can't 3D-Print Themselves? Because... Since smartphone biometric sensors used ...

Japanese telecommunication giant SoftBank has confirmed that the company intends to acquire UK chip designer ARM Holdings for almost $32 Billion (£24.3 Billion) in an all-cash deal. ARM has also agreed to this offer from SoftBank and said that its board would recommend the all-cash deal to shareholders. SoftBank will pay nearly $22.5 per ARM share, which is 43 percent more than ARM's closing share price on Friday and 41 percent more than ARM's all-time high closing share price. The deal is the largest-ever acquisition of a European technology business, first reported by The Financial Times. Wondering Why is ARM really Worth $32 Billion? Founded in 1990, Cambridge-based ARM Holdings designs microchips for a variety of smartphones and powers more than 95 percent of the smartphones in the market. Whether it is Apple's iPhones or iPads, Samsung's Galaxy smartphones, Amazon's Kindle e-readers, the cheapest Nokia phones or Internet-connected devices li...

In Brief What would you do if you get access to a Quantum Computer? IBM Scientists launches the world's first cloud-based quantum computing technology, calling the IBM Quantum Experience, for anyone to use. It is an online simulator that lets anyone run algorithms and experiments on the company's five-qubit quantum computer. Quantum computers are expected to take the computing technology to the highest level, but it is an experimental and enormously complex technology that Google and NASA are working on and is just a dream for general users to play with. Hold on! IBM is trying to make your dream a reality. IBM just made its new quantum computing project online ( with tutorials ), making it available for free to anyone interested in playing with it. Quantum Computers — Now A Reality! The technology company said on Wednesday that it is giving the world access to one of its quantum computing processors, which is yet an experimental technology that has the potential...

Yesterday, BBC broke a story allegedly revealing Craig Wright as the original creator of Bitcoin digital currency Satoshi Nakamoto. However, the highly skeptical cryptographic community is definitely not yet convinced with the technical proofs Wright has yet provided to the media outlets and on his  blog . Now, Wright has promised to provide further evidence for his claim that he is behind the pseudonym, Satoshi Nakamoto. Wright's spokesman told BBC that he would " move a coin from an early block " of Bitcoin owned by Nakamoto " in the coming days. " However, the spokesman did not specify a deadline. " So, over the coming days, I will be posting a series of pieces that will lay the foundations for this extraordinary claim, which will include posting independently-verifiable documents and evidence addressing some of the false allegations that have been levelled, and transferring bitcoin from an early block. ", Wright said in a latest blog post...

In Brief For the second time in past five months, a Brazil court ordered local telecommunications companies to block the popular messaging app WhatsApp for 72 hours, afterFacebook-owned WhatsApp company refused to hand over information requested in a drug trafficking investigation. The WhatsApp's shutdown is affecting more than 100 million users throughout the country. Moreover, if Brazilian telecommunications companies do not comply, they could face a fine of $143,000 per day. Brazil just blocked its roughly 100 Million citizens from using WhatsApp, the popular messaging service owned by Facebook, for 72 hours (3 days). A Brazilian Judge ordered the blackout after WhatsApp failed to comply with a court order asking the company to help a branch of civil police access WhatsApp data tied to a criminal investigation. This is for the second time in last five months when a Brazil court ordered local telecommunications companies to block access to the popular messaging servi...

In Brief Do you know — 1 Gram of DNA Can Store 1,000,000,000 Terabyte of Data for 1000+ Years. Microsoft has purchased 10 Million strands of synthetic DNA, called Oligonucleotides a.k.a. DNA molecules, from biology startup Twist and collaborated with researchers from University of Washington to explore the idea of using synthetic DNA to store huge amount of data. Microsoft is planning to drastically change the future of data storage technology as we know it today. The volume and rate of production of data being produced and stored every day are so fast that the servers and hard drives needing to be replaced periodically, potentially increasing the risk of corruption and data loss. According to stats, 5.4 zettabytes (4.4 trillion gigabytes) of digital data, circulating and available worldwide, had been created by 2015, and it will boost to 54 zettabytes (ZB) by 2020. How will the world suppose to store this 10 times amount of data in next four years? For this, Microsof...

No matter how smart and fast your devices would be, the biggest issue is always with the battery technology. Whenever you go to buy any electronic gadget — smartphone, laptop, or any wearable — the most important specification isn't its processor speed or its camera quality but its Battery Backup , which is not getting better any time soon. What if you could eliminate the very thing entirely? Well, that's exactly what the electrical engineers from the University of Washington has developed. A team of researchers from the University of Washington's Sensor Lab and the Delft University of Technology has developed a new gadget that doesn't need a battery or any external power source to keep it powered; rather it works on radio waves. So, this means you have to turn on your radio every time to keep this device charged. Right? No, you don't need to do this at all, because the device sucks radio waves out of the air and then converts them into electricity. Wireless Ident...

In Brief US-based Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity (IARPA) agency is sponsoring a program to build portable laser sensors that could detect explosives, narcotics and other dangerous chemical weapons from 100 feet away. Dubbed SILMARILS ( Standoff Illuminator for Measuring Absorbance and Reflectance Infrared Light Signatures ), the program aims to identify biological agents as well as chemical and explosive substances in real-time. The Bombs are often planted in public areas, so it is important to detect them in a way that does not harm the surrounding infrastructure and human lives. The new technology could make the front line and home front safer for everyone. The agency has funded five companies via the US Air Force, including LGS Innovations, Physical Sciences, Photonics, Block Engineering, and Leidos, through its SILMARILS program . Currently, the technology used to detect narcotics, explosives, and other dangerous chemicals requires physical...

If you are a Microsoft's Windows user, you may have encountered the infamous Blue Screen of Death (BSOD) . The Blue Screen of Death generally appears when Windows encounters any critical error due to software or hardware issues, displaying a sad face and no information other than "Your PC ran into a problem." However, now the company is apparently giving its infamous Blue Screen of Death a makeover. With the Microsoft's Anniversary Update, the company is making the Blue Screen of Death a little helpful for its users. Microsoft is adding QR code to its Blue Screen of Death (BSOD) in Windows 10 that will make it easier for users to identify potential issues with their devices. The new QR codes are featured in the Redmond's latest Windows 10 Preview, Build 14316, which will debut this summer as the Windows 10 Anniversary Update. Must Read:   Step-by-Step Tutorial to Run Ubuntu on latest Windows 10 Preview Build . Now, when your operating...

Today the Internet has become dominated by images, and it's the major feature that got Facebook to a Billion daily users. We can not imagine Facebook without photos, but for Millions of blind and visually impaired people, Facebook without photos has been the reality since its launch. But not now! Facebook has launched a system, dubbed Automatic Alternative Text , which describes the contents of pictures by telling blind and visually-impaired users what appears in them. Blind and visually-impaired people use sophisticated navigation software known as screen readers to make their computers usable. The software turns the contents of the screen into speech, but it can't "read" pictures. However, Facebook's Automatic Alternative Text or AAT uses object recognition technology that can decode and describe photos uploaded to the social network site using artificial intelligence and then provide them in a form that can be readable by a screen reader. V...

Did you install the latest update OS X 10.11.4? If yes, then you might be wondering with a fact that the Apple had delivered an ineffective patch update this time. Yes! This news would definitely disappoint many Apple users, as the latest update of OS X El Capitan 10.11.4 and iOS 9.3 still contain a privilege escalation vulnerability that could affect 130 Million Apple customers. Just last week, we reported about a critical privilege escalation vulnerability  in Apple's popular System Integrity Protection (SIP) security mechanism, affecting all versions of OS X operating system. Even after Apple had fixed the critical flaw in the latest round of patches for Macs and iThings, the SIP can still be bypassed in the most recent version of operating system, leaving Apple users vulnerable to flaws that could remotely hijack their machines. SIP Bypass Exploit Code Fits in a Tweet Interestingly, Stefan Esser, a security researcher from Germany, has rele...

If you are a Windows 7 or Windows 8.1 user, who don't want to upgrade to Windows 10 now or anytime soon, you might be sick of Microsoft constantly pestering you to upgrade your OS. Aren't you? With its goal to deploy Windows 10 on over 1 Billion devices worldwide, Microsoft is becoming more aggressive to convince Windows 7 and 8.1 users to upgrade to its newest operating system, and it is getting harder for users to prevent the OS being installed. But if you're worried that this out of control Windows 10 upgrade process will force you into downloading an unwanted OS; I have an easier solution to block Windows 10 upgrade on your PCs. A new free tool, dubbed Never10 , provides the user a one-click solution to disable Windows 10 upgrade until the user explicitly gives permission to install Windows 10 . Never10 has been developed by Steve Gibson, the well-known software developer and founder of Gibson Research, which is why the tool is also known as ...

Online harassment has been elevated a step with the advent of popular social networks like Facebook. Cyber stalkers create fake profiles impersonating other Facebook users and start doing activities on their behalf until and unless the owners notice the fake profiles and manually report it to Facebook. Even in some cases, cyber stalkers block the Facebook account holders whom they impersonate in order to carry out mischievous tasks through fake profiles without being detected by the actual account holders. But now, online criminals can no longer fool anyone with impersonation method, as Facebook is currently working on a feature that automatically informs its 1.6 Billion user base about the cloned accounts. If the company detects a duplicate Facebook account of a user, it will automatically send an alert to the original account holder, who'll be prompted to identify if the profile in question is indeed a fake profile impersonating you or if it actually belongs t...

After Microsoft's Twitter-based Artificial Intelligence (AI) chatbot ' Tay ' badly defeated earlier this week, Microsoft has expressed apology and explained what went wrong. For those unaware, Tay is Millennial-inspired artificial intelligence chatbot unveiled by Microsoft on Wednesday that's supposed to talk with people on social media networks like Twitter, Kik and GroupMe and learn from them. However, in less than 24 hours of its launch, the company pulled Tay down, following incredibly racist and Holocaust comments and tweets praising Hitler and bashing feminists. In a blog post published Friday, Corporate Vice President Peter Lee of Microsoft Research apologized for the disturbing behavior of Tay, though he suggested the bad people might have influenced the AI teenager. "We are deeply sorry for the unintended offensive and hurtful tweets from Tay, which do not represent who we are or what we stand for, nor how we designed Tay," Lee w...

Tay, Microsoft's new Artificial Intelligence (AI) chatbot on Twitter had to be pulled down a day after it launched, following incredibly racist comments and tweets praising Hitler and bashing feminists. Microsoft had launched the Millennial-inspired artificial intelligence chatbot on Wednesday, claiming that it will become smarter the more people talk to it. The real-world aim of Tay is to allow researchers to "experiment" with conversational understanding, as well as learn how people talk to each other and get progressively "smarter." "The AI chatbot Tay is a machine learning project, designed for human engagement," a Microsoft spokesperson said. "It is as much a social and cultural experiment, as it is technical. Unfortunately, within the first 24 hours of coming online, we became aware of a coordinated effort by some users to abuse Tay's commenting skills to have Tay respond in inappropriate ways. As a result, we have taken Tay offline and are...