NEW RESOURCES
The Guardian: IMF to launch global public and private borrowing database. “With global debt currently at a record high, the International Monetary Fund is launching a database of public and private borrowing across 190 countries – virtually the entire world – dating back to the 1950s. In April the fund said the global economy was more indebted than before the financial crisis and immediate action needed to be taken before the next downturn. It said worldwide debt now stood at $164tn, equal to 225% of global GDP and up from a previous record of 213% in 2009.”
WRVO: Film professionals hope new database will bring more movies to central NY. “A non-profit group is rolling out a set of resources it hopes will make it easier for film companies to shoot a movie in central New York. CNY Film Professionals is creating a new database on its website that movie makers can use to find any of the 50-500 people, on average, needed to staff a movie set. Elias Gwinn is president of the organization and said it fills a gap that’s kept the movie industry from taking off.”
Digital Library of Georgia: Juliette Gordon Low travel journal available online. “The Digital Library of Georgia (DLG) is pleased to announce the availability of Juliette Gordon Low’s 1908 India travel correspondence… The collection, Juliette Gordon Low Correspondence, Series India Letters, belongs to Girl Scouts of the USA and is housed at the Juliette Gordon Low Birthplace.”
USEFUL STUFF
Ars Technica: Inbox zero and the search for the perfect email client. “Are you the sort of person who needs to read and file every email they get? Or do you delight in seeing an email client icon proudly warning of hundreds or even thousands of unread items? For some, keeping one’s email inbox with no unread items is more than just a good idea: it’s a way of life, indicating control over the 21st century and its notion of productivity. For others, it’s a manifestation of an obsessively compulsive mind. The two camps, and the mindsets behind them, have been a frequent topic of conversation here in the Ars Orbiting HQ. And rather than just argue with each other on Slack, we decided to collate our thoughts about the whole ‘inbox zero’ idea and how, for those who adhere to it, that happens.”
Boing Boing: Bite-Sized Linux: a zine collecting awesome *nix tutorial webtoons. “Julia Evans’s Twitter feed is a treasure trove of her Bite-Size Linux comics that explain core concepts in Unix system use and administration in friendly, accessible graphic form. She’s collected these in a great little print-at-home zine that you can download for $10 (she asks that commercial users making copies for their companies pay $100 to further support her work).” Some of the comments are complaining that they’re not really “comics,” – and they’re not, more like visual representation – but if you like your *nix learning less dry, you’ll like these.
AROUND THE SEARCH AND SOCIAL MEDIA WORLD
The Tennessean: She spent her life archiving African-Americans’ story. Now a rare photo is telling hers.. “Hattye Yarbrough still has the old-fashioned box camera her mother used when she was in high school. She also has a Canon camera that one of her cousins sent her for Christmas in 1938. It took wonderful photographs until 1968 when she dropped it and it broke. ‘I have always collected pictures,’ Yarbrough says, remembering back through her 96 years. ‘All of my life.’ ”
SECURITY & LEGAL
TechCrunch: Hacker Kevin Mitnick shows how to bypass 2FA . “A new exploit allows hackers to spoof two-factor authentication requests by sending a user to a fake login page and then stealing the username, password, and session cookie. KnowBe4 Chief Hacking Officer Kevin Mitnick showed the hack in a public video. By convincing a victim to visit a typo-squatting domain liked ‘LunkedIn.com’ and capturing the login, password, and authentication code, the hacker can pass the credentials to the actual site and capture the session cookie. Once this is done the hacker can login indefinitely. This essentially uses the one time 2FA code as a way to spoof a login and grab data.”
Radware Blog: Nigelthorn Malware Abuses Chrome Extensions To Cryptomine And Steal Data. “On May 3, 2018, Radware’s malware protection service detected a zero-day malware threat at one of its customers, a global manufacturing firm, by using machine-learning algorithms. This malware campaign is propagating via socially-engineered links on Facebook and is infecting users by abusing a Google Chrome extension (the ‘Nigelify’ application) that performs credential theft, cryptomining, click fraud and more.”
RESEARCH & OPINION
Ubergizmo: Alphabet’s Verily Working On Noninvasive Methods Of Blood Collection. “Given that our blood is inside of our bodies, the only way to extract it would be to draw it out, such as with a needle. Not surprisingly there are many who aren’t particularly comfortable having their blood drawn, but some need to do that on a daily basis for health check, such as for diabetes. This is why it is not surprising that companies such as Apple have been working on noninvasive methods of blood collection. As it turns out Apple is not alone because according to a report from CNBC (via 9to5Google), Alphabet’s Verily is also said to be working on similar technology which could be implemented into future wearables, such as smartwatches.”
University at Buffalo: During disasters, active Twitter users likely to spread falsehoods. “We know that Twitter is littered with misinformation. But how good are the social media platform’s most active users at detecting these falsehoods, especially during public emergencies? Not good, according to new University at Buffalo research that examined more than 20,000 tweets during Hurricane Sandy and the Boston Marathon bombing.” Good afternoon, Internet…
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